Mischief Mortem
by littlelimeywriter
Summary: Three teenagers with elemental powers will need to quickly adapt when they travel into the alternate reality of Atmos, as they deal with Cyclonian training, defecting to join the Storm Hawks, and childhood crushes. Self-inserts, sass, romance, impromptu musical takes and disturbance of the 4th wall. Rated M for heavy use of adult language and later some implied details.
1. Chapter 1 - New Arrivals

It was quite peculiar really. Neither my friends, Samantha and Charlotte, nor I were expecting anything to happen on that particular Friday afternoon.

It was Friday afternoon, as I just said. School had ended for the weekend, and the three of us had gone to a newsagents shop which doubled as sweet shop (we all needed to celebrate after going the first hurdle of AS exams) We had bought a few chocolate bars and a bag of sweets. Roland's Randoms I believe. Thanks to the 'freedom' of our school's 6th Form dress-code, and because it was also the halfway point of winter and winter in England sucked, we were wearing moderate-chill protection clothes, e.g. tights and trousers along with smart jumpers and, for one, a cream blazer. I also sported a winter coat, making me look like a rolled up blanket on legs. Since it was after school, we all carried school bags, lightly filled due to the lack of lessons during the exam period. Although in Charlotte's case, her bag was a Sainsbury's plastic bag of psychology.

Anyway, we turned the corner leading to my bus stop, and you know what we saw?

A HUGE forest spreading out from the centre of the road.

Definitely not what you see every day.

* * *

The cars and anyone inside them were oblivious to the spread of trees, entering and exiting in light blue ripples of energy. We all stared at it.

"Well….whoa", I said.

"Since when was there a forest there?", Sam asked, not to anyone in particular.

"I doubt it's ever been there. And all my senses are yelling that magic is to do with it", Charlotte replied, hurriedly walking toward the forest, ignoring Sam and my protests as we followed behind. As we neared the first line of trees, I noticed a humid and warm wind blowing through the branches. But it was well into winter! This was definitely strange.

I gazed over the huge branches, reaching upward and outward, stretching into the sky. Large flat leaves topped them. Down lower, bushes scattered around, dotted with small purple lily-like flowers. I pushed at one bush, and felt the leaves. They were oddly soft, and gave way easily. However, no blue ripples appeared. The other two copied me, to the same result. It seemed that we were not only the only ones who could see the forest, but also the only ones who could enter it.

"Are we going round then?", Sam asked.

"No", I replied simply. "We're going in. All of us."

"Yes!", said Charlotte with glee, and we all hurried forward into the forest. Almost immediately, we heard a sucking sound. Turning around, we watched as the pavement, the road and a car turning round the corner behind us whirled into a grey mix and vanished. The sound of cars rumbling was replaced with the sound of birds and leaves rustling.

"…I guess we're not going to be able to go back that way", I said, grinning cheerily at Charlotte.

"No shit Sherlock", she replied, not so cheerily as she had seemed mere seconds ago, and followed me as we headed further into the woods. Our silent walk was only broken a couple of times, at random moments. Mostly like so:

"Are we nearly there yet?" Me.

"No." Charlotte or Sam.

And so on.

* * *

It eventually became clear that we were badly dressed for this environment, so at one point we pulled off jumpers (and in Sam's case, blazer), and in my case coat, and pushed them into our bags. As I had no room for my coat in mine, I tied it round my waist. Sam even found a few decently big branches to use as walking sticks (I'm not sure where from but I think some trees might have suffered the loss of a couple limbs). The environment turned bizarre, as we trekked on for who knows how long, sweating in the humidity. I was awed by a tall bush covered in glittering blue leaves, imitating a fountain almost. Sam swore she saw a small purple and lilac dotted deer with scarlet horns. Charlotte didn't believe her, until a herd of the deer scattered from nearby. They truly were tiny!

Eventually we came upon a large clearing. Fresh air was blasted into my face, and I breathed deeply.

"I vote we rest now", Charlotte said, dumping her bag and sitting down. I joined her, grinning widely.

"This really is awesome!", I said cheerily. "I have no clue where we are, but it's still awesome." We looked up. It was a blue-green sky overhead, with an odd tinge of yellow around the edge. White scraps of cloud wisped overhead.

Suddenly, three humming planes flew overhead. Charlotte jumped to her feet to wave them down, but I waved at her to stop. My stomach was twisting, but my grin had widened.

"D-Did you see those?", I stammered.

"Yes", said Sam, curious.

"Those were SKIMMERS!", I almost shrieked in excitement. "We're in Atmos!" I promptly keeled over backward, and lay in the grass. "We're. In. Atmos."

"Atmos", Charlotte repeated. "Isn't that the universe in which Storm Hawks is set?"

"Yep", I replied lazily, my mind thrumming through all the things that we could do.

"Wow." Charlotte also now wore a grin that was similar to mine. I know she hadn't watched Storm Hawks in ages, but still. Different world equals opportunity to kick bad guy butt hard.

"What's Storm Hawks again?" asked Sam.

I was about to explain when another set of skimmers flew overhead. They twisted and turned, and we stared in amazement.

"This beats an airshow any day", muttered Sam. I didn't ask when she'd gone to see an airshow.

Then, with a clang, something hit me on the head.

Charlotte and Sam immediately burst out laughing. I scowled at them, but the giggling didn't abate. Rolling my eyes, I picked up the thing that had hit me on the head. It was an odd headpiece, all sharp points.

"You know what this looks like?", I asked Charlotte, in the way a teacher might spring a pop quiz on an inattentive student.

"…Isn't that like the Dark Ace's helmet?", she replied, staring at the helmet.

"Correct! Gold star." And then, still grinning, I plopped the headpiece on my own head. It was fairly big, and the base reached past my chin. Sam looked concerned.

"If that's the Dark Ace's, shouldn't you leave it?", she questioned.

"Pff, if it was the Dark Ace's I wouldn't touch it", I laughed. "But I highly doubt his helmet can fall off. He does all those aerial type stunts, and it never comes off then, right?"

Charlotte also agreed that it was not very probable that the helmet was Ace's. I then picked up my walking stick, and pointed it at her. She also picked up her walking stick, and then broke it in half to create a pair of small sticks. Without talking, we'd made up our minds.

"This time..no mercy", I quoted, holding my 'sword' up in a fencer's pose. We charged at each other, blocked and swiping. Charlotte played Aerrow well, adding in funky quips or quotes every now and again, although ironically was merciless, landing a cracker of a blow whenever possible. I would fire off quotes too, laughing all the while (except when I got poked in the gut). Sam sat at the side, laughing every time we cracked a funny line or one of us got hit on the head. Usually me, which was odd since I had a height advantage. Never underestimate ruthless red-heads.

"No-one messes with the Gomo!", Charlotte proclaimed once, holding one 'sword' up high. I stopped, face-palmed and said in an annoyed tone, "Domo!"

"Whatever." We burst into laughter at that, and started fighting again.

We didn't hear the leaves crackling under someone's feet, or see the red eyes in the undergrowth.

* * *

In a whirl of movement, Charlotte had managed to disarm me, and flick my 'sword' into the bushes behind me. Panting for breath, I giggled as I went to get it.

"That was a neat move there", I called to her, pushing a bush's branches aside as I searched. There was no reply. I guessed Charlotte was also getting her breath back, and continued looking, focused on the ground.

Big mistake.

Something bonked me on the head (again), and my stick fell down beside me.

"Ow!", I grumbled, rubbing my head. Then I spotted a pair of boots in front of me. My gut filled with dread, as I slowly took my view from the forest floor, to chest height, then looking up. Cyclonian symbol, check. Grappling hook thing on left arm, check. Pointy chin POINTY CHIN? Why did I notice that? Well, check. And at head level, burning and clearly angry red eyes, double check. Headpiece, nope.

I knew where that was.

I also knew why the others were silent. They were staring in dread at the Dark Ace, who glowered at me.

"…Run", I said monotonously, breaking the tense silence in the glade. Spinning on my foot, I dashed to the side, just missing getting grabbed. I snagged my rucksack, whilst Charlotte also sprinted to the bushes, Sainsbury's bag abandoned (Well, she was hardly going to need that psychology revision any more). Sam was already disappearing in the forest. I quickly joined them, and from the sounds of undergrowth being demolished, it seemed that the Dark Ace was following us.

"We are so screwed", I panted.

"How?", asked Sam.

"Dude! This is the fucking Dark Ace! Not only is he-" I paused to duck under a tree branch, and heard a terrifying **crack** of severed wood seconds later. "- one of the most feared warriors in Atmos, but he's over twenty and probably as fit as a…PE teacher!"

"A PE teacher?", said Charlotte, looking at me as if I'd suggested to get a Spiny Gorge Sloth as a pet.

"I'm running for my life, throw me a frickin' bone here!", I snapped. As it happened, something _was_ thrown at me, from behind, and I went sprawling on the ground. In a domino effect, I lashed out and grabbed Charlotte's foot. She also crashed down. Sam screeched to a halt when she saw us go down. I let out a muffled groan, and someone grabbed the back of my neck.

Several curses popped into my head at that point.


	2. Chapter 2 - Amphibians?

Charlotte turned back to glare at me.

"Nice one Han", she muttered. "Just nice one." I let out an annoyed whine, since I couldn't lift my head and glare back at her. The Dark Ace did so for me though, although he shushed both of us. Sam was torn between legging it or throwing the hefty stick she was carrying at the Dark Ace. He glared up at her too, and she let out a 'meep'.

"Get down", he said quietly.

"Why?", said Charlotte. 'Hardly in a position to talk, you're already on the ground', I thought grouchily.

"We can discuss my reasoning later. Now be quiet!", the Dark Ace hissed. Sam crouched down, ducking behind a tree. Even Charlotte was silent, which was an achievement on its own.

It was now that I heard the sound of feet. Clawed and heavy from the way they dragged over the leaves and cracked branches with ease. Lifting my head slightly, I peered to my left. Over the dull brown leaf rubble, some of which decided to migrate into my mouth, I saw figures moving about in the bushes. Behind me, I heard Sam and Charlotte let out a miniscule gasps.

Repton and several of his cronies, not Leugy, Spitz or Hork unfortunately (because those bimbos could mess anything and everything up), were treading through the woodland, glaring around. Repton growled with annoyance.

"He's got to be around here somewhere", he hissed, a reptilian tongue flicking out of his mouth. "Split up and search around", he ordered the goons, who vanished into the mottled green of the forest.

"Homygod", I heard Charlotte murmur. I added quietly, 'We are so screwed'. The hand on my neck lifted me bodily up, and I let out a startled "eep", alongside spitting out leaf litter. Retrieving his sword, which I assumed was the item that had been used to knock me over, the Dark Ace motioned for Charlotte and Sam to follow (I couldn't do much, especially with a grappling hook jabbing into my spinal cord). After a moment's thought, he also pulled his headpiece from my head. Good riddance, I thought, the thing had started to feel bloody heavy. Silently, we hurried away from the Raptors, also disappearing into the trees.

Once hopefully out of ear-shot, Charlotte burst out, "Why the hell are they here?!"

"Aaaand why were you _hiding_ from them? Shouldn't you be kicking their butts if they're after you?", I added. The Dark Ace frowned.

"How did you know they were after me?", he asked me.

"Let go of me and I'll tell you", I replied, glancing from him to his arm and back, hinting strongly. One eyebrow went up: the 'Oh really?' look. I scowled.

"If it had been anyone else, they'd be hot on their heels in a chase-and-battle-to-the-death somewhere else. You know Raptors and Sky Knights, hating each other's guts. But since they have a small alliance with Cyclonia, they're more likely to set up a meeting with them, and would only go after you if you duped them with fake crystals or somethin'."

After my little ramble, I found myself reunited with the ground as the Dark Ace dropped me. Both his eyebrows were up now; the 'WTF?' look. Sam, who appeared to be holding back a giggle, failed to hold it back. Everyone gave her a 'We didn't need that' look.

"….My bad", she apologised quietly. The Dark Ace shook his head hopelessly.

"How do you know all that?", he asked me.

Charlotte answered before I could think of a bad excuse, "Becaaaauuuse, weeee'reeeee really good spies! Yep, that's it we're spies."

"Yeah, what she said!", I added.

"We're spies?", said Sam. Charlotte glared at her.

"Yes, Sam. We are _spiiiiieeeees_."

"Okay no need to exaggerate."

I face-palmed.

"Pardon my colleagues. We are professionals, but-"

"Master Cyclonis hired us!", interrupted Charlotte, and my stomach dropped like lead. I spun round to yell at her, but since the Dark Ace was in the vicinity, I mimed a hand across the throat, sign-language of 'Stop it stop it or we'll die!'.

"Master Cyclonis eh?", said the Dark Ace. I spun back to repair Charlotte's damage, but a savage smirk had already appeared. "I believe it must have been fate that we had met."

"Uh, really?", I said. The Dark Ace laughed, and I heard Charlotte gulp behind me.

"You were spying on those Raptors weren't you?", said the Dark Ace.

"YES!", we all chorused, nervous grins plastered on our faces and eyes now glued on the large sword on the Dark Ace's back. Charlotte leant over to me and whispered, "Are we gonna die now?"

"Hopefully not", I replied. "But it's your fault if you do."

"Whabuhwhuwhyyyyy?", complained Charlotte. Sam tapped us on the shoulders.

"Guys. He's walking away", she hissed. I could have squealed in joy as it looked like we were going to live, but instead I followed, sharpish. The fact he looked over his shoulder and said loudly, "Hurry up you three!", added to the idea of going with him.

"Where are we going now?", Sam asked, picking up scattered bags, including Charlotte's Sainsbury's bag. Guess the psychology wasn't going to be disappearing quite yet.

"If we knew that we wouldn't be going", replied Charlotte.

"I landed my skimmer quite some way away. I've also sent a message out, some Talons will rendezvous there to accompany you to Cyclonia." Once more, I felt my innards drop. "You do have sky-rides around here, don't you?"

"Repton found them", I replied quickly. "We were unfortunate enough to accidently park them near some fragile ground. It collapsed on him."

"…It what?"

"Never mind." As we followed the Dark Ace, Charlotte elbowed me, and I mouthed 'What?'

"Are we really going to see Master Cyclonis?", she whispered eagerly. I scowled at her.

"When this is over, I'm going to _kill_ you", I hissed, mimicking strangling her. She grinned awkwardly.

"Uh, why?"

"You know she is the lordess of DARKNESS!" That last bit came out slightly louder than I intended, and got strange looks from Sam and the Dark Ace.

"Yes I know!", Charlotte replied, a little annoyed. "So, can we meet her?"

"…Cyclonis. Cyclonia. Get it?"

"….Aw hell yeah!", Charlotte cheered quietly. I rolled my eyes, and grumbled, "I'll never understand you."

"THERE HE IS!", snarled an all-to-familiar voice. We all spun round to stare at a glaring Repton, a crackling energy boomerang in his hand, well, claw.

I feel that one word in unison crossed our minds. However, I will not divulge that word as it would most probably be edited out.

Without a word, we girls spun round and started running. Fast. Around us we could see more Raptors appeared from the undergrowth.

"We. Are. Screwed", panted Sam.

"Or maybe not?", added Charlotte. I glanced over to her.

"Elements?"

"Try it?" The redhead and I linked hands and span on the spot. Wind twisted from my hand, while fire poured out of hers, effectively creating a fire tornado around us. And from the sound of screaming, we had fried a couple of Raptor tails. As the flames died down, I saw Sam aptly controlling several vines into constricting a Raptor mook. No sign of the Dark Ace.

"He's probably someplace else kicking butt", said Charlotte, voicing my thoughts. A low snarl came from behind. Repton glowered over us.

"Who are you?", he hissed.

"We're the Elemental Angels", said Charlotte, grinning triumphantly. "And we're here to kick your butt."

"Like so!" I stamped the ground, opening a hole from which poured a small flood, knocking him off his feet and into the bushes. I turned to smile at Charlotte, but she was glaring at me.

"….He's a reptile. Not an amphibian", she growled.

"Not any more", I replied sheepishly.

"Dude! Really?!"

"Dudette! Not dude!"

"Fine then – DUDETTE! REALLY?!"

"Thank you!"

"You're welcome!" We glowered at each other, then Sam managed to pull us apart before a proper cat-fight started up.

"Guys! Raptors. Ring any bells?"

"Oh yeah", I said, Charlotte still glaring smoking holes into the back of my head.

"How about you let me handle this?", she said. I could see sparking flames popping in her hands.

"But why?", snapped Sam. "You guys have been doing all the action so far!" As she said this, a Raptor sneaked up behind her. Without turning, she punched him in the snout.

"Because – well – we're more experienced!", Charlotte retorted. "And you punched him wrong."

"Oh here we go", I muttered, head in hands. Sam and Charlotte ensued in a glaring rage war, shown by the floating rocks and rubble. I pressed my fingers to my temple, starting to feel exasperated. Then another problem occurred.

Repton reappeared. Soaking wet, fist clenched around his boomerang, and most certainly furious. I prodded Sam in the shoulder and knocked Charlotte in on the head, muttering angrily, "We have a problem here!"

In response Charlotte spun round, and blew a tongue of fire at the Raptor. He dodged, glaring angrily.

"Your little crystal tricks won't save you now", he growled.

"Crystal?", said Charlotte questioningly.

"Well, they are the things that power this place", Sam said quietly. Looks like she'd remembered some Storm Hawks trivia during the while we'd been here. "He must think we're using some." Dissolving into the clearing, many more Raptors, alongside those that had recovered from earlier. Not to mention the appearance of the troublesome three: Leugy, Spitz and Hork, who looked scarier up close than on TV.

Several engines in the undergrowth snarled. We all exchanged looks, thinking, 'What?' A Switchblade Elite, trailed by two Talon Switchblades, crashed through the bushes. I stared, startled as the Dark Ace swerved to a halt in front of us.

"Need a lift?", he asked, offering a hand. 'He just cracked a joke', I thought, amazed. Still, a free ride is a free ride. I took the hand and he pulled me roughly on, so I sat between him and the Skimmer handlebars.

"Wait, how come-", Charlotte began to complain, and Sam shoved her hard toward one Talon, while she moved to sit with the second. Repton growled angrily, but made no move to stop us.

"Unless you'd rather that the fact you were bested by children other than the Storm Hawks came to the news of Master Cyclonis, I'd suggest you don't speak of this again", said the Dark Ace. Repton gave a reluctant nod. Engines roaring, we all shot off into the undergrowth again.

As the Skimmers weaved in and out of the trees, I was rather thankful to be stuck in front of the Dark Ace. Despite the fact I now had to flinch whenever a tree branch came too closer, whenever we took a sharp corner I felt I would fall off, if not for the arms that were in the way. Peering back, I noted Charlotte was also sat in front of a Talon, gripping onto her seat but looking like she was having the time of her life. She shot me a thumbs-up, and I nodded. Badass lil redhead. Sam meanwhile was sat behind a Talon, being taller than the man and perched 'side-saddle' like Charlotte, due to their choice of attire (skirts).

In a wave of sunlight that temporarily blinded me, we left the shelter of the forest. Out here, I saw sweeping grasslands, similar to that of Terra Bogaton. Which was interesting, and made sense to why the Raptors may have been here because it was bloody hot and OMIGOD!

We were nearing a cliff. And not slowing down. If anything, I felt the Switchblade engine rumble louder as we _speeded up!_ With a pretty good idea of what was coming next, I squeezed my eyes shut so I wouldn't see what might possibly be my premature death and therefore scream.

Didn't stop me from feeling a moment of free-fall, as the Skimmer drove off the side of the Terra, or hear the sound of the wings deploying and the jerk that followed at they caught the wind that tore at my face. Gasping involuntarily, I gulped back air as the Switchblade engine roared and it rocketed away from the Terra. The feeling of flight was amazing, a sense of pure freedom. However, it carried a sense of sheer terror, for if I were to fall...

I still grinned like a madman, and guessed the others were too. The wind pressure stuck me to the seat and I dared not twist around to check my schoolmates. Even glancing from side-to-side meant I couldn't see them, and led to my assumption that the Skimmers were flying in a V-formation.

The Dark Ace's voice over the wind snapped me out of my trance: "Since we are travelling to Cyclonia, we will be making most of the journey on a Destroyer, for..comfort's sake."

Before I could ask "A what?" a loud deep fog-horn belted out from a thick group of clouds. A Cyclonian warship drifted into view, and the Skimmers curved around it. A hatch opened at the rear, and this is where we descended into the ship. With a click, a jolt and a hammering heart, the Switchblade brought in its wings, landed and swivelled sharply to the side, knocking me against one of the Dark Ace's arms. He promptly pulled said arm away with a scowl, leaving me to quickly snatch at my balance and dignity, (and the Skimmer's seat) before dismounting the vehicle. I did so also, and checked my buddies. Charlotte was checking her hair, quite nonchalantly, although one could see her hands were shaking as she went through her bag, making sure her books hadn't fallen out. Sam, hair miraculously neat, was muffling giggles of hyperness from the adrenaline rush. I sighed, relieved we had made it in roughly one piece. It was going to take some time before we became used to flight in this world.

As per the Dark Ace's order, we were accompanied to a small room, probably a spare one normally used by the Talons. It was rather cramped, and comprised of two sets of bunk-beds.

"Shotgun top bunk!", Sam belted as soon as our Talon 'guards' had left. I shrugged, dropping my rucksack on a lower bed. Charlotte, sitting in the bed opposite me, tilted her head.

"Lemme guess. You're thinking that this is way too easy, and something bad is gonna happen either on the way to Cyclonia, or when we get there", she said, almost smirking with the knowledge of her accuracy.

"Correct on all terms, mostly because of how fidgety we've been acting", I replied. "We're gonna have to get our acts straight if we're going to keep flying under the radar. By which I also mean literally, since it's very likely we'll have to fly one of those Skimmers eventually."

"Hey, most of us are seventeen", Sam dropped in on the conversation.

"Exactly. How hard can it be?", Charlotte quipped, leaning casually against the wall.

"It'll be like riding a motorbike. But with wings, and a whole lot more space", I summarised, finishing with, "Think you can handle that?"

"Sort of" and "I can try", were the group's replies.

"Now, long story short, we're gonna have to bail before we meet Master Cyclonis. Sorry Charlotte", I quickly apologised, as the redhead gaped with open annoyance.

"You did say we're her spies. Which means the Dark Ace will ask about us. When she says she doesn't know us, we're toast", said Sam.

"And I want a head-start on running away", I added. Charlotte huffed, grumbled, and finally mumbled, "Fine."

Patting her arm, I nodded appreciatively. "Thanks. Trust me, you don't want to see Master Cyclonis when she's ticked off."

"Dude, I know what she's like when she's ticked off", Charlotte retorted, shrugging my arm off. "And she's not as bad as me." To solidify her comment, she bunched up a fist in my face and fired it up. Leaning away from the fiery hand, I held my hands up.

"Yeah, yeah, I believe ya."

"So…can we sleep now?", Sam asked. "I'd rather not think about running away from evil people until after a nap. Also, it'll give us more energy."

"True. We should probably eat something too."

After a meal of chocolate, and a quick look over our baggage (I uncovered my sketchbook, which was unharmed, but mine and Sam's calculators appeared to be broken), we all flopped into our bunk-beds with agitated thoughts and tired minds. Sleep was slow to come, but acted a merciful blanket that muffled the nerves.

Unfortunately, when wakefulness came with the feel of cuffs shackled to the wall, red lighting and an angry face wearing a familiar helmet, I felt that sleep may have only increased our problems.


	3. Chapter 3 - Heavy Metal

Fear. Mind-numbing, staggering, heart-thumping fear. Adrenaline rocketed through my veins as sleep was pushed as by a terrified awareness. I instinctively tugged on the handcuffs that were in line with my shoulders, but no result. A short yelp fell out of my mouth, which I promptly clamped shut. My struggles woke Charlotte, who wriggled in her shackles and looked as furious as I felt scared, fire popping and blazing around her hands and shoeless feet. Sam followed suite, with the exception that there was no fire or rage, but she screamed in surprise. Loud. I almost thought she was using what wind powers she had to create sound waves that might knock down the Dark Ace. Wishful thinking. He just smirked widely.

Smirked.

He was…laughing at us! Any fear was washed away in a torrent of blind anger. Screw the fact he was one of the worst enemies in Atmos, and Master Cyclonis right-hand man, I was angry at him. Wind swirled malevolently around my clenched fists. His grim smile didn't fade, even slightly.

"Good to see you're all awake", he said smoothly.

"Same to you", Charlotte shot back. "If this is how you treat allies I'd hate to see the state of your enemies when you're through with them."

"What allies?", the Dark Ace questioned. And I'm pretty sure all us girls felt our stomachs drop in unison. Turning his back on us, the Dark Ace emptied a leather purse of crystals onto a table. Most of them were red and purple, and some were eerie shades of green. They did not look like Nil or Tickle crystals.

"You claim you are spies. But for which side?" He selected a red crystal, a low-grade Firebolt I guessed.

"Yours, honestly!", Sam said frantically. His reply was an unbelieving 'humph'.

"I have seen your fighting. Untrained, reckless, nothing like that of a Talon recruit with even minimal training", he droned with a tone of contempt.

"Yes, Sam", Charlotte said, twisting her head round to scowl at Sam, who retorted with a stream of angrish at the redhead.

"I was talking about all of you", the Dark Ace growled. Charlotte gaped, glowering at him.

"Offended!", she snapped in a high-pitch.

"We're stuck in a torture room and she's _offended_?!", I murmured to myself. "Reality check needed please."

"However, you all appear to possess strange powers, without the aid of crystals", the Dark Ace continued, ignoring any annoyed outcries and leering in Charlotte's face. "You control fire and earth, while the elder controls these as well as water and air."

"Um, actually I'm younger than these two", Sam corrected him. "I'm just taller."

This knocked the Dark Ace out of his stride for a second, and he even stumbled over a word or two before continuing his statement.

"Since you two are more accustomed to heat, it probably wouldn't affect you much if I were to do this-" He tapped the crystal against a handcuff and the metal sparked. Yup, it was a Firebolt alright. "- So it would be more effective to use this against you." And with this said he turned on me.

Well scrap.

I tried to stay as far away as possible from that crystal as the Dark Ace pointed it at me, waving it in an almost teasing manner in front of my eyes.

"Tell me everything", he demanded darkly.

"We come from an alternate universe where there aren't Terras or Skimmers or crystals and people can't fly like you guys can but we know about you and the Storm Hawks and stuff because it all on TV 'cause you have a TV show well technically a cartoon but it's still a show and you're also on the internet which means we can Google it too-"

"Google?"

"Yeah Google and people write stories about you defeating the Storm Hawks or them defeating you and you're kinda dead most of the time including at the end of the series-"

"WHAT?!" This was from Charlotte. Whoops. Spoiler alert.

"Concurred", added the Dark Ace in disbelief.

"And don't even get me started on shipping-"

"HANNAH!", Sam butted in, before saying in a worried tone. "Don't go there. We might break him."

I blinked, practically hyperventilating, before focusing on the crystal again.

"…Hang on one second. Is that actually a Firebolt?"

The Dark Ace smirked, then laughed nastily. Shrinking away, I wondered if I'd made myself look nicely stupid. But then he turned the crystal. The object was only half red, which had covered up the green swirls on the back.

"A combination crystal. A small experiment by Master Cyclonis. Quite effective too."

"That's, uh, that's a Hypnosis crystal on the back, isn't it?", I said, nervous. He nodded.

"In effect, yes. A weak one, but enough to make you tell me the truth."

"Which she did", Charlotte dropped in. "Believe it or not, everything she spilled was true. We can back that up." Sam nodded in agreement.

Appearing thoughtful for a moment, the Dark Ace turned and left the room. As he did, he gave some quiet orders to a pair of Talons. One took up guard at the door of the room, the other headed over to use and unlocked the handcuffs that held us in place.

As we rubbed our raw wrists and asked each other if they were fine, the second Talon snapped, "We've been given permission to use force should you try to escape."

"Dude if we tried to escape you wouldn't last a second against me", Charlotte retorted drily. I held up a hand, telling her to back down.

"Not the time, mate. Save your strength for when we really need to run", I said quietly.

"Ditto on that. Plus from what I think, we might be presented the chance of meeting Master Cyclonis", added Sam. "If she believes what Han here said, then there's a chance that she'll ask us to join the Cyclonian force."

Sam was right. In a sense.

About half an hour later, the three of us were frogmarched to the Throne Room of Cyclonia. I tried memorising the route of lengthy corridors that we went down, but each tunnel of metal lit with red lamps seemed identical. Not to mention I wasn't entirely sure where we were, so there would be little chance of finding an escape route to a landing platform which would have some skimmers, along with the problem of leaving all our Earthly possessions behind. And from what I know, Charlie and Sam are as protective of their stuff as I am of mine, especially my sketchbook.

The Throne Room was sweet. At least Charlotte thought so, seeing as that was the first thing she said when we entered the room, framed with black metal and dominated by a tall machine that loomed maliciously over a high-backed throne. A purple hooded figure rose from her seat on the throne, and the Dark Ace dropped to one knee in a bow. Sam followed suite, coughing quietly so we would notice and take hint. The figure strode over, the hood of her cape peeling back like a deadly flower, opening wide and revealing the face of Master Cyclonis.

"Why don't you do the hood thing more often?"

"Charlotte, not the time!", I snapped under my breath. Although she made a decent point.

"I would take that as a compliment", Cyclonis said drily, with a tone of disdain. "If it were not made by young fools who thought they could try to outsmart me. Posing as spies? All my true spies are either Nightcrawlers or…more well trained."

"Permission to stand, please?", Sam asked. Cyclonis scowled for a moment, but nodded all the same. As we stood, Sam continued, "The reason for our pretending is seriously complicated, and we apologise for any offence meant."

"Wait, why are we apologising? We're the ones who got locked up!", Charlotte growled.

"But we did take on a false title." I was seeing where Sam was going with this. Sort of. "It may well have caused insult to the ranks of Cyclonia. Seeing as we were pretty lousy spies."

"If we took on the proper training though", said Charlotte, the plan spreading to her as she began to grin. " We could at least be Talons. Cyclonian trainees tend to be younger than us too."

"Younger than you?", the Dark Ace questioned. I jumped. Having forgotten he was still there.

"Yup. We're all seventeen. And the Storm Hawks are, what, fourteen last time we checked?", Sam quipped.

"Whatever time you checked was about four years ago", the Dark Ace muttered sullenly. I raised an eyebrow in surprise.

"Really?" Wow. Had our breaking through realities caused a time jump or something? Or was this a time bubble where the four or so years the series had been shown for had actually occurred in Atmos as well? Part of me figured the latter.

"I am still waiting for your explanation of pretence", Cyclonis hissed, folding her arms. Ah, yes.

We explained. Leaving out anything spoilerific or directly relatable to the story-line, but with decent descriptions of our own dimensions. Afterwards Cyclonis stared at us with a barely masked suspicion, then ordered guards to come in from outside the room and take us back to the cell.

A tense silence reigned for about a minute after the door locked behind us.

"That went well."

WHACK

"HEY! Unnecessary violence was _not_ requested", I whined.

"I needed to hit something!", Charlotte retorted. "And the wall would hurt."

"And Sam?"

"No-one hits Sam."

"So why did you have to hit something?", Sam asked.

"It was so goddamn _tense_ in there. I had to let off some steam." Looking around for something else to punch, Charlotte started pulling at the shackles. Then superheated them into putty. Grinning widely, she settled down to metallic arts-and-crafts, with Sam poking holes in the walls.

Make that poking holes through the walls.

I found a piece of scrap metal that wasn't stuck to the wall or red and soggy, and started doodling on the nearest flat surface. Even in a place like this, butterflies and curly-wurlies were sure to make it feel more homely.

Oh who am I kidding? It mostly made a screeching noise.

"Hey guys!" Sam and I looked over to a scarily eager Charlotte. "I made a metal fist!"

"Fascinating", I muttered.

"Can you make gauntlets?", Sam asked, now interested too. Ugh, fire-controllers! They had body heat to play with, not to mention this place was uncomfortably warm.

"Could you guys keep down the simmering and fire? I don't even have a bottle of water to cool down", I moaned. Sam gave me a despairing look.

"You realise there's a pipe of water running underneath here?"

"…Oh." Slapping myself mentally in the face, I sat down and searched for the source of water. Well, it was hardly a source since it was constantly running. Grasping at it though, I pulled.

A spout of water sprayed the room from a sudden hole in the floor.

"HANNAH." I glanced over to Charlotte and Sam, looking quickly more and more bedraggled and similarly pissed off. I plugged the hole with my metal 'pen' and a thick layer of ice. At least I had my water now though. Sam managed to lever water out of her and Charlotte's clothes, the latter of which had a sour expression.

"You put out our fire", she muttered, clicking her fingers but only making sparks. "Not cool."

Her tone changed when she added, "By the way, how good are you at picking locks?"

"Charlotte, I thought I told you the plan was to 'go along with all this'. That includes being locked up."

"Yes, but there's green stuff coming out of the vents and I don't think that was part of the plan."

Oh bollocks.

"Abscond! Abscond!" We dashed as one for the door, the logical escape route. Taking a thin piece of metal from Sam, I rammed it into the keyhole and started jiggling frantically.

"Come on, come on!", she hissed.

"I'm seriously under pressure here I'M TRYING!", I snapped back.

"Clear!", Charlotte shouted. On instinct, we both dived to the side, as she launched a punch at the door that ripped it off its hinges.

"Holy shit!", I breathed, glancing back at Charlotte. Her fist was covered in a thick layer of blackened metal, and she grinned at me staring.

"Cool, huh?"

"How did you get it on?", I asked as we piled out into the corridor. Our Talon guards were nowhere in sight.

"Dunno really." Choosing a direction at random, we started jogging down it, keeping an eye and an ear out for patrolling guards.

"How are you going to get it off?", Sam asked.

"Cross that bridge when I get to it", was Charlotte's reply. And it would be a bit later. Especially since an unfortunate Talon had stepped out into our path, and barely got a word out to raise the alarm before Charlotte clobbered him.

"How're we doing on that plan of yours?", she asked me. I started to reply, saying we should back-track and think of some sort of apology, but looking back only showed me that the evil cloud was starting to trickle out of other vents. No wonder everyone else had bailed. Apart from this one guy at our feet.

If this was poison, it wouldn't feel right to leave him to suffocate.

"Yo, Sam, we need air-cushions." Creating a whirl of air underneath the body, Sam and I shuttled him off ahead of our trio, still with the death cloud advancing on our backs. When a heavy metal shutter stood in the way of our exit, I beckoned to Charlotte.

"After you."

"With pleasure", she replied leisurely. Backing up, she went for a quick run-up and punched the door square on. The metal cracked off her hand, and there was a dent left. But it didn't fall.

"Any other ideas?", she asked, shaking her hand with a wince.

"How about leverage?", said Sam, waving away her lot of air-cushions and firing a blast underneath the door. It was shunted upwards, wavered, then fell backwards with a crash, narrowly missing some toes. We scuttled through the now-empty doorway, the Talon still out and floating along.

"For a high-tech fortress, ya'd think they would have better doors", I muttered.

_CLANG_

Another door shut behind us, unfolding rapidly from the ceiling, and cutting off the death cloud.

"For once, the jinx actually saved our hides. Nice one", said Charlotte, with a punch to my arm. Like one of those friendly ones. Only painful.

"Now what?"

"Well, we're alive, we're not trapped behind an air-lock, two of us are still damp", Charlotte listed off. "And we have one unconscious guy."

"Actually I think he's awake", Sam muttered, poking his shoulder. "You should probably go before she who punched you decides to do it again."

He nodded, before scarpering.

"Quiet bunch aren't they?", I said. "When they're not shouting about destruction and conquering Atmos etcetera."

"Yeah, whatever." Charlotte started grinning. "C'mon though. We have freedom! Sort of."

"Not exactly."

"What the crag?", I blurted. Somehow, at a point when we'd all ignored a corner of the room, Master Cyclonis had entered with the Dark Ace by her side. This sudden appearance was enough to make us jump and cut short any celebrations.

"What do you mean with the congrats?", Charlotte asked with a frown.

"What you just went through was a test", Cyclonis explained. "And you passed."

"A test?!" Sam looked horrified borderline pissed-off. "But we could've died!

"A necessary hazard. However, as it is, you didn't die", said Cyclonis, now wearing a triumphant smirk. The lass had a point, we were still breathing after all

"It would likely have been regrettable if you did", the Dark Ace added.

"What, so…you were worried?", I joked. Joked, mind, with a touch of hope. Was this guy capable of concern after all?

"No." Well that was enough to chuck the hope out of the window. "The clean-up would have been tiresome though."

"Oh cheery-doo", Charlotte muttered sarcastically.

"Why the glum expressions? You've gotten your wish. Just don't think it'll be easy because you're children", said Cyclonis, turning her back on us as she talked. "If anything, because of your 'added benefits', it will be a lot harder."

I've got to say, she was right.


	4. Chapter 4 - Battle Arena

We went through intensive training for a week. Some part of me had assumed it'd only be for three days before we got to some sparring, but I was incorrect. The sparring only happened after a tight schedule of weapons practise, hand-to-hand fighting, 'crystal' practise and skimmer training for seven days. Early morning rising, late evening falling-into-bed. Talon commanders kept an eye on us and yanked us through exercises. By day two I was in agony. By day five my sense had become numb enough to carry on going. Sam managed to day six, further than both myself and Charlotte, before collapsing during a set of crunches. As school-kids shoved into military life, we weren't feeling great.

Our first weapons exercise was an…interesting one. Handed three crystal staffs, we were told to lay about into dummies. Charlotte took a single long disinterested look at her staff then dropped it.

"Fuck this. If we're gonna fight, it'll be with our own weapons." In a spark of fire, she pushed out her hands. Instead of her usual crossbow with ignited bolts, a blazing red hammer dropped into her grip. Exchanging curious looks, Sam and I put aside our staffs and imitated her. A heavy-set blue bow and quiverful of arrows dropped into my hands, whilst Sam received a luminous white pair of spiked wheels.

"Nice going", I commented. "Cool chakrams, Sam."

"Yeah, they are pretty sweet."

"How come you got the bow?!", Charlotte stared at my weapon.

"I…do not know. Especially since my aim sucks. Look." Taking an arrow at random, I notched it into the string and pulled back, wincing from muscle strain. When I fired, it hit the arm of a dummy. "I was trying to aim for the stomach too."

"Wanna trade?", the redhead asked eagerly

"Not for the hammer, thanks."

"I could take it", suggested Sam. "I don't really mind. My last weapon was a trident, remember."

"Fair point." With the three-way exchange, a curious change occurred. The chakrams switched from white to silvery-green; the bow slimmed down into a lighter, orange model; and the hammer of all things lost its head for a set of nasty prongs at either end, and slots for what we assumed would be crystals.

"Whaddya know? The plot-hole fairy's drunk again", I muttered. "Not that it's a bad thing or anything."

We laid into the dummies. With great enthusiasm. Best stress relief of the day. Sam managed to switch crystals from the Talon weapon to hers, and we found the rod could let off some scorching blasts! Singed the head of the Talon commander with us, which certainly cheered us up.

From there, we were set apart and given work on developing our fighting skills. We had ruthlessness, but tactics and aim not so much. Sam had to deal with recoil for powerful shots, which at times knocked the staff from her hands. Charlotte was better at archery than myself, but still wasn't good enough to hit a moving target. And me, well, chakrams are fairly good in close range but throwing required knowledge in how to boomerang them and catch them without slicing ones hands apart. We were handling our weapons well though by the end of the week.

Crystal practise, eh, not so successful. It was basically an hour a day where we learnt how to use a crystal. Sam had the advantage with her staff, but Charlotte and I had to go manual. Without gloves, Freezers chilled, Firebolts could burn the palm if held for too long (we develop a hot-potato strategy), and even using them for too long made my head spin. It explained one reason for which Piper and Cyclonis wore (partial) gloves, but also gave me a new level of respect for the crystal mages. Eventually, our time got cut out and placed back into hand-to-hand combat.

Hand-to-hand I do not want to talk about. The bruises may be gone but I can remember the pain.

Then there was skimmer training.

There is a reason that learning to ride a motorbike takes a shorter time than learning to drive a car. Not only have I checked online post-return, but I have proof. Also the fact skimmers are easier drive than motorbikes.

Clutch? Nope. Hand-gear? Nope. Keyhole? Nope, and neither is there a Keyblade. They haven't invented keys over here. You've got the handlebars, give 'em a twist and suddenly _vrrrrrm _you've got the engine kicking up. I don't know the mechanics of the process. But you do need to drop in a Fuel crystal when you first head out. We had to learn that much. One Fuel crystal for a skimmer meant up to 5 straight days of driving and flying. And that would be without overnight parking. Naturally, flying faster meant the Fuel would burn out quicker, but we didn't care much of that.

They sent us flying on the second day, once we had the hang of steering and could accelerate without a problem or a panicked scream. Surprisingly fun too. But then on the 'flying day' as we dubbed it, being told to do a drag-race down one of the landing platforms, and bring out the wings to avoid crash-landing into the Wastelands was not exactly the most fun way of learning.

But by God, after tugging back and having the wings flick out and just circling the tower, the feeling afterwards could only be paired with _ecstatic_. In terms of the drag race, Sam won, Charlotte dodgem-ed into me, sending me off the side and into an early dive, and I managed to pull a 360-spin. 'Flying day' was a good day.

It was after the week-of-death when I realised that there'd been no alarm clock of a Talon hammering on the door. Despite this, I had woken up. We had been separated into different rooms, all small, semi-circular with matching bunks. Flopping out of the bed, still in uniform from the previous day, I clicked open the shuttered window and took in a slatted view of Cyclonia. Bloody red, clouded over by pollution, but shining enough with distant sunlight. My need for morning-light satisfied, I headed over to the door. It slid open.

"Huh", I mumbled. Odd. It was ordinarily locked. Stepping cautiously out, it was then that I noticed Commander Ravess standing outside. Snapping a salute, I felt a shot of guilty nervousness. Was I busted for sneaking out?

"Since you're already awake, rouse your other Talons", Ravess ordered. "Today you take the next level in training. You'd best be prepared."

"Yes ma'am!"

Sam was ready and waiting, sitting on her bed with two crystals in her hands.

"Where did you get those?", I commented with a raised eyebrow. "Planning an escape?"

"And when did you turn Talon commander?", she replied sourly, putting the crystals into a pouch at her side.

"Eh, got up early. Broken body-clock. I was only joking about the escape anyway", I said, trying on a grin. Sam's smile in return was a good sign.

That left Charlotte. Who unlike us, wasn't awake yet. And didn't want to be.

Inspecting the singed door side and the new black spot on the wall opposite, I threw a helpless look to Sam.

"Need a hand here."

"Fine." Rolling her eyes, Sam stalked in. A few minutes, some raging, and a cloud of steam later, and she returned with a sour-faced Charlotte.

"There'd better be something to hit", she muttered.

"Consider yourself in luck", Commander Ravess commented. "You are to head to the main training hall. Follow."

Exchanging curious and excited looks, we followed.

Gathered on an observer's platform overlooking the hall, it seemed a mixture of daunting and interesting. With seating arranged around it like some sort of coliseum, and the main fighting area no longer surrounded by wire fencing and instead a series of thick glass panels and heavy metal walls, it looked far more intimidating than the wrestling episode had shown it to be. Perhaps it had been updated after that time.

Charlotte, suffering from a week's deprivation of coffee, was grouchy. Leaning against a railing, she clicked up fire between her fingers with a constant glower at anyone who came close to her. The elemental trick however seemed to make Commander Ravess more curious than concerned about the scowling elemental.

"That's an interesting trick you've got there", Ravess said, with only the slightest hint of a smirk. Not wanting to be outdone (curse my competitive nature!), I stepped up.

"Not at cool as this though." Pulling a piece of metal that had eventually been battered into a spherical shape, I stared to spin it in the air between the palms of my hands. A stupid grin slid onto my face. I couldn't help it, the action was nostalgic.

Others were not so impressed. Charlotte most of all.

"Oh really?", she growled, before punching toward me, sending a tongue of fire which scorched the metal ball to burning red. It scalded the air around my hands, causing me to start juggling both the ball and the air.

"Ah! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!" It took a couple seconds before I realised I could cool things down with a water bubble. Charlotte went one up from that, and stamped up a spike of metallic rock that knocked me onto my butt and the water bubble onto my feet.

"Dammit, now my foot's wet", I mumbled drily.

"Oh, I can help you with that." When Charlotte's tone went sickly sweet, you knew you were screwed. Getting my feet, I shot across to the other side of the viewing platform with a rushed, "Nope, nope, nope!"

Commander Ravess stared in disbelief. She'd probably expected the week-of-death to crush any childish behaviour right out of us.

"Are they-?", she began to question, when Sam hopped in.

"Yes, they're sane, and yes, they're always like this", the taller brunette explained.

At this point, my hide was saved from fiery doom when a stooped Talon arrived in the viewing platform.

"Excuse me, Mistress Ravess, the-the main training hall, including the battle arena, has been cleared for you."

"Battle arena?" Charlotte was instantly distracted with another opportunity for violence. "Shotgun."

"Really?", Sam muttered.

"Really", Charlotte replied, threatening the other with enflamed fists. Sam merely raised an eyebrow, pointing a warning finger that was also on fire.

"Perhaps you should save that for the arena", Ravess snapped. "You will go in one at a time. And I think we know who wants to go first." Nodding her head as a command to follow, she stalked off. With a wild grin, Charlotte skipped off behind her. As they vanished down a set of stairs, I couldn't help but wonder out loud:

"Hang on. Has anyone seen Snipe?"

From up on the platform, Sam and I moved swiftly over to the railing so we could get a better view of the arena. And possibly the ass-kicking.

Charlotte entered alone, looking a little confused when Commander Ravess shut the gate behind the redhead.

"Uh, hold up. Why am I going in alone?", Charlotte asked.

"Who said you were the first one here?", Ravess replied, nodding with her head to gesture behind the teen. She glanced over her shoulder. Snipe was waiting by an opposite door, mace ready and a sour smirk on his broad face.

"It's smushing time!", he roared, spinning the mace round and off its handle, the chain unwinding as the head rocketed like a small and imminently deadly meteorite toward Charlotte. She ducked, and the mace-head made a dent just where her own head would have been.

"Damn. You get right onto things, don't you?", she commented, flames igniting in her hands. "Nice style."

It was like a blitz. Snipe swung the mace with care-free violence, tearing trails in the air and across the walls, slow but brutal and fierce. Charlotte responded in kind, faster than he but with less accuracy, shooting blasts of fire across at Snipe and getting more and more frustrated because each time he would block them with the mace. Eventually, she stood still and bellowed across at him:

"OH FRAG YOU!"

And then she got punched in the stomach by the mace.

And…well…Sam and I ducked as soon as we saw the orange glow, but from the black scorches across the walls both within and outside the battle arena, there had been a lot of fire. A _lot_ of fire.

Believe it or not though, Snipe was mostly unharmed. Charlotte was completely burnt out though. Not singed at all, but powerless and tired. As she keeled over, Sam muttered, "Oh shit!"

"Should we-?"

"Probably." We hopped over the side of the viewing platform, myself gliding directly over the seats and boosting myself over the arena wall. Sam went for a less refined method, air-bubbling down over the seats as if on a space-hopper. When faced with the arena wall, she flicked herself square over the side, somersaulting and landing next to me. I, personally, was in shock.

"How the frag did you do that?", I asked.

"I'm just too good", Sam replied, heading over to Charlotte. Snipe prepared his mace, but I raised my hands.

"Dude, we're not here to fight. Just, y'know, drag her out." Snipe huffed, then swung his mace onto his shoulder and marched out. Meanwhile, Charlotte had come round slightly.

"Hey. Charlotte. You still with us?", Sam asked, waving a hand in front of her face.

"Boom bitches, that's why you don't fuck with the redhead."

"Well, at least her personality's still intact", Sam mumbled to me.

"Of course, sweetie, of course", I replied to Charlotte, crouching down and patting her head. Her glare told me to stop. Immediately. Sam rummaged in one of her pouches, and pulled out a bar wrapped in foil.

"Here, have some chocolate. It'll help", she offered, unwrapping the chocolaty goodness and holding out a square. Charlotte sat up slowly, directing her glare at Sam.

"…He wasn't a fucking Dementor!", she snapped.

"And where the hell have you been keeping that?", I asked. "Does the plot hole fairy like you or something?"

"Uh…yeah?" As Sam put away the chocolate, much to my dismay, Charlotte was pushing herself back to her feet.

"Get back in here Snipe! We're going for round two!", she shouted. "I'm not done yet."

"Oh no, we're dropping you at the infirmary", I snapped, going to drag her away when she flamed-up. Wincing, I gestured to her whilst looking to Sam. "If you please?"

Sam huffed and rolled her eyes, then grabbed Charlotte by the shoulders.

"Charlotte. Bed. Now", she demanded, wheeling her around and pushing her toward the exit of the arena.

"But Saaaaaaaaaaaaaaam."

"No buts!" Charlotte sniggered at that remark.

"Hey, hey Sam…" After a pause, they both grinned, and chorused, "I like big butts and I cannot lie. You other brothers can't deny, when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist and a round thing in your face you get sprung!" And so they marched out, hip-bumping and everything.

I was mildly aghast. And very much in need of mind-bleach.

"What the fuck did I just witness?", I muttered, mostly to myself. I didn't expect a reply.

"I was going to ask the same thing."

"WhatabuddaHUUUUH?" Jumping a foot to the side, I stared at the Dark Ace, who gave me a very confused look. "Um. How long have you been there? And why are you-?"

_Click_.

At the sound of the arena doors locking, I felt a deep and sudden realization. Accompanied by a sincere sense of utter panic.

"Uh. Guys?"

I was alone. With the Dark Ace. In the fighting arena. Not sure which part of that was the worst.


	5. Chapter 5 - Rotation Battle

As the others reached the infirmary

_Whoawhoawhoa._

What?

_What happened? With you and the Ace?_

You don't find out.

**No fair!**

Yes fair, I'm the narrator after all.

_What if I flame you?_

AH. Fine, fine, fine….wait. I never planned to write this bit.

**Then let me.**

But. Narrator. Also you weren't there.

**You told us this afterwards. So if you can't write it up, I will. Now shove.**

**"Now that we're alone…"**

**"You know how creepy that sounds, right?", Hannah promptly interrupted. The Dark Ace looked fairly miffed.**

**"I was going to add", he continued, in an annoyed tone. "That since your friend had some sparring time with Snipe, I thought I may as well...how would you children say? Join in the fun?"**

**"Ey, whoa, wait. Firstly, are you suggesting we, uh, spar? I mean, fight sort of? And secondly we are not children."**

**"That is precisely what I am suggesting and at seventeen you're not adults yet."**

**"That depends on who you ask, according to JK Rowling we're adults and that's good enough for me."**

**"Who is JK Rowl- never mind. I came here to fight not to converse technical ages." The Dark Ace took hold of his sword and Hannah backed away quickly. "Are you not even going to defend yourself?" **

**"Give a sec, big guy", Hannah retorted, her chakrams appearing in a flair. "Gotta get myself ready. Get psyched, y'know?" **

**For a moment, they stared each other down. The Dark Ace ignited his Firebolt. Hannah crouched, chakrams held wide.**

**Then she sprinted.**

**"Fuck this I'm out!", she yelled, dashing for the edge of the arena.**

**"Get back here and fight, girl!", the Dark Ace snapped. Oh man, was he pissed off. Bolts of red were fired from the Firebolt, narrowly missing Hannah. Whipping up the air, she mimicked me in making a bubble of wind, although instead of space-hopping she crouched on it, sending it up the wall and around and around and around.  
"One of us is going to get dizzy eventually", she yelled back, ducking another laser bolt.**

**"Or not", he growled. **

**"Uh-" The next barrage of crystal energy tattered the wall and quite a bit of Hannah's face. Falling from the wall, she rolled, ending up face-down on the floor.**

**"Ow."**

And then you wonder why I didn't want to talk about it.

_But it's funny. You getting beat up and all._

Oh hardehar.

**For a second she just lay there, until something hot and metal pressed against her neck.**

**"Hardly a fight", the Dark Ace sneered. "Barely a warm-up. I don't see the point of keeping you slackers around."**

**"Slackers?!"**

**A chakram point was aimed at the Dark Ace's face, held up by a furious Hannah. Stalemate.**

**Then he smirked, and walked off, leaving Hannah very confused.**

_Is that it? No flirting or anything?_

CHARLOTTE NO.

**Afraid so.**

Thank you. Now:

As the others reached the infirmary, they were met by Commander Ravess.

"That was quite the performance you gave back there", she commented, giving Charlotte a sour look. Her hair seemed to have gotten singed.

"Dun fyck…eith redhead", Charlotte muttered. "Nitch."

"Very powerful, yes, but there was no use of weaponry at all, which was a disadvantage in some ways", Ravess continued. "Tomorrow you will begin separate training. As I understand you have a talent for archery, I will be your tutor."

"Uh, what about me?", Sam questioned. "I didn't even get a go in the arena."

At this, Commander Ravess grinned quite nastily. "Oh, I know. Your partner is waiting for you in the Throne Room."

_No._

Yes.

_Damn Sam, you got the short straw on this one._

Chill. Remember, her partner was a Nightcrawler creepazoid. No way she could take on Cyclonis.

**Oh cheers.**

Now maybe we should leave the fourth wall for now –

_You mean this slightly intact window?_

- and get back to the point. That being we all end up in the infirmary beaten up and just a little ticked off.

"…Well that went _spec-tac-ularly_", I muttered.

WHACK

"OW! Hey, punching definitely not called for right now."

"Yes it was", Charlotte mumbled. "Totally was. It would've been on fire too if I weren't so fucking drained."

"And thank Merlin for that", Sam added. There was a silence that settled on that section of the infirmary, with the three of us settled on adjacent beds. A poor Talon that was also beaten up sat opposite us, looking uncomfortable at being stuck in a room with three pissed teenage girls.

"Next comes a week of having that lot as our 'tutors'. Fantabidosy", Charlotte whined.

"Oh, I dunno. It might not be so bad", Sam said.

"WHAT?!"

"I don't get Master Cyclonis after all."

"Damn."

"That musta been close."

"I have Snipe instead."

"Ow."

"Burn."

"Yep….'nother positive is Hannah gets her Ace."

"MY…what the heck?" I folded my arms, pouting furiously. "I don't know what on Atmos you might be possibly insinuating with that sort of remark."

"Blabber all you want, you like him", Charlotte said with a smirk.

"GODDAMN YOU."

"And they called it puppy looooove~"

"Singing is not necessary. Especially when I can overturn your bed."

"From there?"

"Even from here you don't know how close to explosive I am right now!"

"Um, I don't want to interrupt, but-"

"YOU STAY OUT OF THIS!"

Poor Talon.

Once we'd 'recovered' (been kicked out for almost tearing up the infirmary), the following week comprised of practising how to kick butt and getting our own butts kicked.

Sam got the heavy hitter, so most of her tutorials involved much the same. From the sounds of metal being blown up and wood cracking, she got very, very good at it. Much to the point where during an archery lesson between Charlotte and Commander Ravess, the bloody wall got broken down by a Cannon crystal bolt, which smashed the archery targets as well. Sam proceeded to poke her head through the wall, and cry, "Bull's-eye!"

She also began combining crystals, often to unforeseen results. Including a similar event happening to the room where the Dark Ace and I were sparring. The firebomb rocketed through _two_ walls this time though, and Sam's comment was an expression of surprise and, "So that's what it does."

That was at least before the Dark Ace fired his Firebolt at her, causing her to abscond with great haste.

Charlotte was already great with archery, but now she was having to combine the archery at times with elements, controlled and uncontrolled. This sometimes included wind pressure (man she got annoyed because her hair was a mess afterwards) or having to avoid spouts of fire (less of a hazard) all whilst maintaining a direct shot with bow and arrow.

And sometimes she'd trade crystal tips with Sam.

BOOM

"Dammit I missed the target….but I hit a Hannah."

"Why me?", I had to question, after my arm was defrosted.

Meanwhile, my lessons tended to involve sparring with the Dark Ace. With the problem that both our weapons, and therefore both our fighting techniques, were completely different, it was simply a matter of improving how I fought. This included timed bouts (how long I could hold out against a full out attack) and footwork (it's in the name).

Hand-to-hand combat continued between the three of us.

Still not going to talk about that.

And finally, the three-way tournament. It was a day that stuck with us for a long time, not just because of the fighting, or the possible funniness of the situation as a whole, but the plot-point later on.

Spoilers.

That morning, we were sent out to the battle arena. However, when we saw it, it seemed significantly different to the last time we'd been there. It had been divided into three sections, with a set of wheels and pulleys surrounding the base of the arena. Sent to different doors, we entered a section each. In each one, our 'tutor' was waiting.

I felt pretty antsy about the whole thing. Charlotte gulped. Sam just waved nervously when we exchanged looks.

"You are to face your mentor head on", the Dark Ace said. "There will be no holding back, so we expect the same from you. This is going to be no easy practise."

"Oh fuck", muttered Charlotte, bringing out her bow in a resigned manner.

"Ditto", echoed Sam.

"Hey, I'm worse off than both of you", I snapped through the barrier.

The fight started instantaneously and without warning. Quickly, we had to defend as well as send out attacks. I stuck with my well-used duck-and-fire technique, often using the chakrams to brace against the Firebolt sword that hammered down on my mock-shields. Sometimes I'd have the air toss me straight up, high enough to get peeks over the barriers to see how the others were doing. The only reason I didn't outright jump them was because that would've been against the rules. Those barriers between us girls seemed extremely strong, if one consider the number of times I heard Snipe mace hammering the sides or explosions (caused by both Sam and Charlotte, although Sam was slightly more explosive).

_Huh? How is that?_

She blew up more shit than you.

Charlotte wasn't going well. I mean, she was setting off flames whenever possible, but the stress wasn't helping her performance. As another arrow missed her target, she snapped, "Give me some time to reload dammit!"

"This is a proper fight. You make your own time", Ravess retorted.

"Fine!" Stamping her foot, the redhead brought up numerous spikes which set Ravess off-balance. Grinning triumphantly, Charlotte fired again. And missed.

"Your aim is still poor though."

"Fuck!", Charlotte cussed angrily. However, the arrow did hit a lever, knocking it forward. Abruptly, another set of barriers shot up between us and the mentors, and the ground shook.

"Guys!", Sam yelled over the din. "I think the ground's turning." She was true. The arena rotated, in a mocking random spin. When it stopped, and the barriers went down, our opponents had changed. And everyone, even us, wore expressions of disbelief.

"What?"

"The?"

"Fuck." Alright, Charlotte was less 'disbelief' and more 'annoyance'. Why? Her new opponent was the Dark Ace. "Why me?"

"You're ginger?", Sam suggested, gearing up against Ravess. Charlotte squealed in delight, which I didn't expect. Mind you, I was trying not to panic at the sight of Snipe.

"Oh my god you are a genius!", Charlotte yelled to Sam. "I would kiss you but FIGHTING." This exclamation was due to the fact the Dark Ace had had enough of pointless chatter and had fired the Firebolt. Sam sent out an explosive crystal, sending up a cloud of thick purple smoke, but when she spoke her tone was tinged with confusion.

"Wait, why am I a genius?"

"Because reasons now FIGHTING", was Charlotte reply.

"Baksun bizi!", I shouted, for lack of better words. Snipe hit hard but he hit slow. Chakrams though were pretty bloody fast. Plus I was better at catching them now. They boomeranged in, causing Snipe to duck, and I hit out with a punch backed by a wall of heavy air pressure. While he was momentarily floored, I hopped to Charlotte's barrier, bouncing up and leaning over the side for a peek. She and the Dark Ace were basically at each other's throats, Charlotte trying to get distance to fire arrows but the Ace having none of it. So she'd flare up, hitting out with fireballs. Seeing me looking concerned, she yelled, "I can win this!"

"Really?", I replied, sounding doubtful. I'd fought this guy more than she had.

"I'M GINGER you idiot!", Charlotte snapped. Ah.

"Ooh, I get it", I said, now having the light bulb switch on. Just as a hand tugged me down from the barrier top.

"I know right!", said Sam, also having a pause and overhearing us. "Now why am I a genius?"

"FIGHTING!", Charlotte and I chorused. Another heavy explosion and a fog-horn sounded from Sam's section. I bounced back up, to see the fighters leaving the arena. Huh, that seemed rather quick. Drifting back down, I let gravity take hold and hammered down my feet onto Snipe's shoulders.

"Bathtime mate!", I quipped, bringing my hands up. Water burst the pipes below and showered him down. As the water hit, I snapped around a wind chill, freezing him in place. After a moment standing in front of the frozen Snipe, I took a chakram and tapped it on the layer of ice, cracking a large section of it off. Snipe flexed and the rest of the ice shattered and fell. Instead of taking up the fight again though, he headed to the side, whacked a button, and another fog-horn sounded. Ah, I'd won! Guess that meant Sam had won too.

That just left Charlotte.

"I heard that quip, by the way", Sam commented as I jogged up steps to reach where she was sitting in the 'audience' (the seats surrounding the arena were deserted. We weren't surprised). "When I was leaving. The whole 'bathtime', thing."

"Bad quip?", I asked, sitting next to her. Ooo, good spot. We could easily see down into the arena.

"Very bad quip."

"Damn." Then we fell into silence, watching the fight continue. Charlotte appeared to have run out of arrows, and now was literally on fire. _Literally._ The Dark Ace was handling it fairly well, and seemed to have changed the Firebolt crystal in his sword for a Freezer. Smart, although it was odd seeing him fight with a blue sword. There was regular explosions, and the ground was pretty much demolished.

"I'm surprised one of them hasn't dropped dead of exhaustion yet", Sam commented. I nodded in agreement. "…So, um."

"I'm backing Dark Ace to win.

"Dude, I backing Charlotte, it's the safest bet."

"Fifty-fifty."

"Deal." We high-fived, attention still focused on the-

HOLY SHIT

"CHARLOTTE!", Sam yelled, standing up quickly. Smoke was billowing out of the top of the arena, where the mother-of-all firebombs had just gone off, bigger than the one Charlotte had carried out in her first fight here. It had shook the place, knocking me out of my seat and Sam forward one row. Red lights flashed a warning as Talons began to leak into the room, some with buckets in hand.

"Did-Did you just see what I saw?", I stammered, levering myself up slowly, not being so eager to follow Sam back down to the arena. "That was-That was like a fucking PHOENIX!"

"Yup." Sam had reached the door to their section of the battle arena. Examining it, she wound back and stamped the floor. A chunk of rock split the door in two, allowing more smoke to rush out. By now, I'd decided to abandon my spot on the floor and join a couple Talons that were spraying some sort of foam through the door. Sam and I directed air flows through as well, pushing out the smoke rather than pushing it inward and risking another fire-bomb from the fresh oxygen. I dived in first, the moment the smoke level had risen to a height I could crouch to get under. Still circulating air inward, I shoved deeper, searching. It didn't help the abnormal amount of smoke (seriously, there was a fuck-ton of the stuff) made the light dimmer.

A hand! Grabbing it, I found a pulse whilst swirling up a patch of light through the smoke cloud. Hm. Not Charlotte in this case.

"Found the Dark Ace!", I yelled back toward the entrance. A few moments later, Sam's voice sounded to my right.

"Found the Charlie."

"El-ee-why. Charley", followed right after.

"Stop complaining. At least you're conscious", I muttered quietly, heaving an arm over one shoulder and squeaking when the hand attached to said arm pushed down on my shoulder. Oh hey, he was conscious too. Mostly.

"I think they sounded the foghorn, sorry mate", I commented as the Dark Ace stood. "You did well though. Charlotte's a pisser to fight."

"I heard that", Charlotte snapped through the smoke

"Take it as a compliment!", I retorted, blowing apart a better path to the door. To one side I could see Sam pushing up the smoke in eddies and miniature whirlwinds, clearing the arena completely. Charlotte leant against the arena wall, looking battered but especially smug. As I accompanied an unusually quiet Dark Ace, I passed by and overhead:

"So why am I a genius?"

"Because I'm a redhead."

"Oh, and so is Aerrow!"

"Gold star", I murmured with a chuckle. As the Talons went into the arena to help put out any embers and tidying up the damage, the Dark Ace sat down on one of the seats with a heavy breath. I paused, then decided against sitting next to him.

"She didn't get you too badly, right?", I asked. Silence. "Y'know, the whole silent and moody tone is starting to be a bit-"

"I'm getting tired of children defeating me", he said, flatly. Bluntly, even. "I am the most feared warrior in Atmos. How can I retain that title when I can be defeated by- by teenagers." With a hand he gestured to Charlotte, who was leaving the arena and chatting with Sam. Looking over, the ginger winked at me and tugged Sam away from us. Oh the little-

Shrugging, I said, "You do realise that not only is Charlotte, and with her Sam and I also, an elemental with powers that might be considered to be at the level of Master Cyclonis, but we're also teens from another dimension. Although, it really depends." With a casual grin, I continued, "Some would consider us adults after all."

Then the strangest thing happened. The Dark Ace stood, seemed to ponder, and finally turned to walk off. But as he did, he ruffled my hair when he walked by. Watching him walk off, I could only slowly pat my hair back down and wish for the redness to disappear from my cheeks.

"Wait", said a Talon that seemed to pop out of nowhere. "Are you blus-"

WHACK

Wow, Charlotte was right. Random acts of violence _are_ therapeutic.


	6. Chapter 6 - One Short Day

A few hours later (after Charlotte had had a nap we'd not wanted to wake her up from for fear of the decapitation that would follow), we'd gathered in the skimmer bay. Charlotte was polishing up her baby (we'd been given our very own skimmers after the first week), which not only had it somehow been made over with black paint during the time between Charlotte getting it and now, but also-

"It looks like a Harley", she said happily. "It sounds like a Harley."

"Doesn't fly like a Harley", I quipped.

"It's still a Harley", Charlotte growled. "Davison."

"My name's not Davison, it's-"

"Hannah." Sam tapped me on the head. "No."

"Aw." I perched on the seat of my skimmer, which I'd left untouched by magical paint. Well, mostly. Apart from the rebellious blue streaks under the wings. Sam had been less subtle, having disappeared for an hour to reappear covered in blue and white whispering "Camouflage!" triumphantly. It caused much confusion until we later saw she'd painted her skimmer completely blue and white.

Back to the present:

"Ace at six o'clock", Charlotte said, head popping up like a red meerkat for a moment to speak before ducking back down again. I hurled a water disc under my skimmer and hers', and the angry squeak and glare when she reappeared was worth the imminent death wish.

The Dark Ace seemed pretty used to this behaviour by now, considering the fact he simply fired a bolt at the ceiling. We quickly snapped to attention, apart from Sam who managed to trip backwards over her feet. Once she was standing, and brushing herself off sheepishly, the Dark Ace cleared his throat and spoke:

"After your 'commendable' final test, you have been cleared as Talons. Your first duty is patrol."

"Hell yeah!", I cheered.

"Really?", Charlotte complained. "Patrol? What happened to fighting Sky Knights and stuff?"

"I don't think we're ready for that", Sam commented, as the Dark Ace stalked off to talk with several other Talons that were filing into the skimmer bay. Some looked at us with worried expressions as he talked (we had somewhat of a reputation by now).

"Totally do", muttered Charlotte, giving her baby a final wipe-down and heading to the crystal store room for a Fuel crystal. In there, she yelled, "Heads up, y'all. One!"

Bang! A Fuel crystal shot out, which Sam grabbed.

"Two!"

Bang! The second Fuel crystal I had to dive to catch.

"Three!"

Bang! This one soared up, then down, then clanged into her skimmer's crystal port.

"And FREE FOR ALL!"

"Oh God", I murmured, ducking under my skimmer with Sam following suit. This was a habit Charlotte had developed during skimmer training: whenever we needed Fuel crystals, she'd 'fetch' them for us, aka, firing them out of the store room. Unfortunately, this time around it seemed she'd decided to do the same for the other Talons. They panicked, some taking the initiative and catching more than one for the others that had dived under skimmers like myself and Sam.

"ENOUGH!", the Talon commander shouted. Everyone went silent. A final Fuel crystal went donk on his head, following an awkward 'ping!'

Charlotte stuck her head out of the store room with the shout, "Sorry, that was a misfire!"

"Get to your skimmer", snapped the Talon. "We're taking patrol route 42. Stay behind us and try to memorise the route."

"42", I giggled. "Answer to life - "

"The universe", Sam added. "And everything!"

"By the way, have you-" Without looking over, Sam raised two sets of bags, kinda like saddlebags. We'd discovered these bags were often used when a patrol went out for a longer period of time, and immediately filled a pair with our personal items, including old outfits. I took one while Sam took the other, fixing them in place with wary looks. One never knew after all…

With a revving rumble, the skimmers engines fired up. The other Talons led, rocketing out of the bay and up off the landing platform. Charlotte made her engine roar and blasted out, taking off and looping with a whoop. Sam took off smoothly, in a less flamboyant way. I drove to the end of the platform, dropped, and then brought out the wings. The patrol circled the tower of Cyclonia, in what seemed to be a salute, before shooting off in a seemingly random direction.

We flew straight for about an hour. The red skies of Cyclonia peeled away to reveal blue and white fluffy clouds.

"Oh. My. God." I stared. "I fucking forgot how pretty the sky looked. Without pollution."

_Click_.

Glancing to the side, I saw Charlotte on her phone. Where the hell had she been keeping that?! She grinned, waving it.

"Snapchat!", she whooped, before shooting forward once more. I rolled my eyes, and looked for Sam.

Sam?

"SAM?", I yelled, looking around.

"Up here." I stared up. Sam seemed to roll out of nowhere, wave, then roll back into invisibility.

"What the frag?", I asked.

When she rolled back again, she replied, "Camouflage."

Huh. Her skimmer had managed to slide into the backdrop of normal coloured sky with ease. I gave her a thumbs-up.

Then I heard a 'pop'.

And another one.

"Sam." She reappeared, stopping her rolling. It was a little disconcerting, since if you didn't focus she just seemed to be hovering in mid-air. Or hugging a cloud. I scrunched my face into a frown. "We really don't need a Donkey on this trip", I told her.

"At least we're not going far, far, far, far, far, far, far away", she replied. I face-palmed.

"Can you maybe find something to do? Any crystals you can play with?", I asked. Sam shrugged, and started searching through her pouches which usually contained crystals. Her eyebrows went up as she pulled out something.

"Hey, I found my mobile!", she called over.

"Yeah, Charlotte already found hers", I replied, deciding to rummage through my own pocket-pouches. "Oh hey, I got mine too!" I pulled out the old Nokia dinosaur, turning it over with a puzzled expression.

"…It has WIFI." Sam had an even more puzzled expression than me. "In the name of Merlin, how the heck does it have WIFI?" With a rumble, Charlotte roared back overhead.

"I have signal! Hell YES", she cheered. "Wait. Is the WIFI free?"

"Here, probably", Sam commented, putting her phone away. "Why have you not replaced that phone by the way?", she asked me.

"I haven't had the excuse", I muttered, turning the phone over. After a pause, I lobbed it into the Wastelands. The others watched it disappear down through the clouds.

"Well that's one hell of an excuse", said Sam.

"But aren't Nokias indestructible?", asked Charlotte. "Like, _really_ indestructible."

"Then the archaeologists are gonna have one hell of a time", I replied.

Silence reigned once more. Heck, I managed to twiddle my thumbs, when I should have been steering. But then again, highly localised air currents make flying just a bit easier. Then:

"…one short day in Cyclonia City." I jumped, a little, then stared at Sam. She shrugged, grinning. Ah, what the hell.

"One short day full of so much crap", I joined in the singing.

"One short day and we're fleeing the city", added Sam.

"Now that we've been here."

"You'll know we've hit stuff", joined in Charlotte with a gleeful smile.

"Before we are done!", we chorused.

"There's one building tall as quaxwood trees, torture rooms and libraries", sang Sam.

"Talons and evil shit a hundred strong." My line.

"There's crap like we've never seen." Charlotte.

"It's all grand." Sam.

"And it's all red!"

Sam and Charlotte twisted around in their skimmers to glare hotly at me. I pouted, snapping, "Well it bloody well isn't green!"

Shrugging, we chorused, "I think we've found the place we don't belong."

"I want to leave this hoy-palooy."

"So we will leave for good someday, to live our lives-"

"And make our way."

"But for today we'll wander…" Charlotte paused, and Sam and I looked over to her in confusion. "And destroooy!"

"SHUT UP!" The Talon's annoyed yell snapped us out of the...whatever it was.

"What the fuck did we just do?", Charlotte managed to sum up our general feelings.

"I dunno but it was cool!", I said.

"And accurate", Sam added. There was a kerfuffle up ahead, which grabbed our attention. A huge ship, with the front part shaped like a horrific skull, loomed up through the clouds.

"MURK RAIDERS", yelled another Talon.

"Finally, something to do", cheered Sam.

"Other than sing", I added quietly.

One thing I hadn't known about Murk Raiders was that sometimes they bag skimmers as well as proper shiny pirate stuff. So I was surprised when they came at us on skimmers. As well as the chomping skull of doom. And cannons.

"DIVE!", I shrieked, as the cannons started blasting. I didn't really need to. Everyone was pulling retreats or loop-de-loops or 'fuck this I'm out' manoeuvres. Sam had her crystal staff out from God-only-knew-where-she-kept-it, and was going all out on blasting anything with bad teeth and an eye patch. Pity the Talon that got too close, and had a bad eye. There were still some problems with recoil, as there were times she would simply fire and roll several metres afterward. I stuck with the usual duck-and-run, even managing to play 'chicken' with two Raiders. They never knew what hit them (actually they did – each other). Charlotte did what she did best – blow shit up. She was reckless about it to, sometimes forgetting to avoid incoming blasts. So when that one cannon bolt sheared off part of her fringe, she froze.

And went ballistic.

Sam and I dived under the cloud cover the moment she stopped, part of her hair gone. For safety reasons of course. A furious shriek sounded seconds after we hid.

"Charlotte", Sam commented, keeping her skimmer in a hover. There wasn't much need to go anywhere else, we were safe down below. Another shriek went out.

"Phoenix?", I guessed, although not that surprised. It was Charlotte's _hair _after all, she was going to go all-out for payback. Not long after, Murk Raiders and Talons alike began dropping through the cloud cover, albeit sans intact skimmers. This caused us to have to shift about to avoid both people and metal debris.

"Look, it's like raindrops, but pure evil!", Sam said with a cheery grin. I frowned, giving her an open 'what the heck?' stare.

"You keep your evil raindrops", I muttered, sliding out of the way of a screaming Raider. As if on cue, Sam started singing: "Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens-"

"Bright copper kettles and NO, Sam, what we have we said about the singing?", I snapped. Sam ducked her head down, pouting.

"Just trying to diffuse the tension."

Charlotte abruptly dropped down through the cloud cover, face creased in leftover anger. We immediately shifted to either side, just in case.

"NOT THE TIME", the redhead snapped, before going back up. There was about a minute's pause before I said, "Wow, she is cran-kay!"

"HEARD THAT."

"Meh."

We waited another few minutes. Once there'd been some time since any Talons or Murk Raiders had dropped through the clouds, Sam made her way back up. Charlotte was just circling a bit of empty airspace, a forlorn look on her face.

"They ruined my hair", she said, quite plaintively, like a whining cat.

"Don't worry, you can barely tell", Sam reassured her. Not true though. The tips were black and still smouldering. As was Charlotte's glare. Sam shrugged "You not going to blow us or anyone else up?"

Charlotte mused on this for a moment, before snapping her fingers. Down below, the Murk Raider ship let out a dull _boom_, before half of its inside exploded outwards.

"Okay, I'm finished now", Charlotte said with a smug grin.

"Hannah!", Sam yelled. I poked my head up through the clouds.

"Clear?"

"Yes." Going with Sam's knowledge on the situation, I pulled up to hover next to the others.

"So um", I started. "…Where's the rest of our patrol?"


	7. Chapter 7 - Drahoušek

After half an hour circling around dead space, we realised not only had Charlotte landed all of our patrol members, but we had no clue where on Atmos we were. This caused a bit of fury from Charlotte, some complaining from me, and Sam stuck in the middle trying to stop the anger, as per usual. Eventually, we came to the conclusion attacking each other was not going to get us anywhere, so we calmed down and started off in a random direction, did a 180, then headed in another random direction.

"I don't know about you, but the fact we have Talon skimmers is bad enough, but we're also wearing Talon uniforms", Sam commented after a while.

"Crag", I muttered as I looked down, realising the same thing as her. "Should we land somewhere and change?"

"Into what?", Charlotte asked.

"We snagged our old stuff", Sam explained.

"I dunno about you, but I'm not going to be flying through Atmos wearing a goddamn pencil skirt, no matter how cute and black it is."

"Point taken."

"Oh, wait. I had jeans in my psychology bag."

"Got it!", I yelled, holding it up. Charlotte did an abrupt double-take.

"What the fuck?"

"Sam said we snagged our old stuff. That meant everything", I explained with a grin.

"Still, it would be better to have stuff that would be better for flying. 'Cause, this probably sounds weird, but-"

"These uniforms are really fucking comfy when we're flying", Sam interrupted Charlotte, who paused, turned to glare at Sam, then finished off, "Yeah, basically."

"Fine. How about we find a terra that sells uniforms or flying outfits?"

"And how we gonna pay for it?", Charlotte asked.

"Wait! Hold up, hold up." Sam was digging around in her pouches.

"Don't tell us. Money crystal?", I chuckled, mostly out of amazement.

"Nope. Money." She held up a bag that jingled, and became the centre of attention for a good minute as Charlotte and I goggled.

"They use proper money?!", Charlotte said eventually.

"Different currency, same gold. I bet we could pass off a pound for something really expensive if we tried hard enough", Sam laughed as she pocketed the bag.

"How much is in there anyway?"

"No clue. But it was in a safe in the back of a locked store-room that had 'Do not enter' on it."

"You went snooping without me. I am disappointed", Charlotte tutted, as she pulled off ahead of Sam, all the while giving her a disgusted look.

"I have money! Be happy dammit!"

We were.

Landing on a small terra, we stripped off the Talon uniforms and switched for our Earth clothes, in preparation for actually landing in the next populated terra. Everyone went through their pockets, and pulled out any loose change. Just in case. Charlotte had a pound and two twentys, Sam had a handful of ten pences, and I came up with a ton of ten and twenty pennies.

"Where the hell did you get those?", Charlotte asked.

"Bus fare change", I replied with a shrug.

* * *

From there, it was another twenty minute flight before a terra with houses and streets rose into view. It was no Atmosia, but it wasn't a Gale either. By asking around, we found out the name of the place was Terra Bellasarie. It had a distinct Belgian-theme, with small stone and wood houses dotted in a circle around a single main street, that started at a tall building which was probably  
the city hall or courts, and ended at a series of small landing strips for skimmers and airships. We parked up there, and headed down the main street. My ears were killing me, numbed by the air as we'd flown. Charlotte was grimacing, and when I asked what she'd gotten frozen she replied, "My knees." In fact, everyone's joints were aching in one way or another. Sam was not a happy bunny of us three, being the only one who didn't have trousers to cover up legs, and insisted on buying legwarmers as soon as possible.

"You know, I think the whole uniform or Atmosian outfit buying spree is the whole point of actually staying warm up there", I reminded her.

"I know. But can't I get legwarmers anyway?"

"Yeah, why not."

One set of helpful directions later, and we pushed open the door to a uniforms store. The shop-owner, a round lady who for all her bustling us over to a stove in the back and cooing over Charlotte's frost-bitten cheeks could have been a female Junko.

"Oh, _jste ubozi drazi_", she muttered, handing us a mug of…something warm and brown. Sam took a tentative sip and nodded to us two eagerly. It was good apparently.

"_Promin, ale mluvite cesky?_", I spoke up, one eyebrow arching. The lady laughed.

"_Ne, ne, mluvim bellasery._"

"I have absolutely no idea what you two are saying", Sam muttered.

"She's speaking Czech, but in this reality it's Bellaserian. I think." I shrugged, and returned to the conversation. It was an absolute 1-1000 chance that we'd landed on a terra that spoke this language, and it made me wonder if there were other terras out there. I mean, there was Gale, which seemed pretty French. What about a German terra? Or even a _Mexican_ terra?

After a length of talking between us, since Mrs Drachova switched between Bellaserian and English with ease, we got around to asking what we needed. She smiled and nodded in understanding.

"A trio of wish-to-be Sky Knights then? Ah, ever since those _Bouře Jestřábi _started fighting against the Cyclonians, our old squadron has been looking to your kind of youngsters as well. Mind you, it's only fair that the ladies get their hand into this business." With a chuckle, she added, "Shouldn't stop you from looking good while you bring down Cyclonis, _ne_?"

We all nodded in unison, Charlotte's face growing a large and happy grin.

Mrs Drachova stood back to let us to browse the shop. There was some arguments about having a general colour scheme, but since our tastes were so vastly different, we just split up to find outfits we liked and fitted. The cool part was that everything was stitched together out of a range of colours and materials, making it more interesting in finding the 'right thing', and done so well you'd have thought they were designed to be in such a steampunk-patchwork manner.

I was trying on a uniform that combined purple and blue when Mrs Drachova reappeared, carrying several curved metal plates.

"There's a reason this place sells to you flying folk", she said with a wry smile, holding up one of the metal plates that actually were pieces of armour. She helped me fix on shoulder- and knee-guards, during which I asked, "Your terra, it's fairly close to Cyclonia, right? Don't you ever find it worrying, or troublesome?"

Mrs Drachova scowled angrily, turning to glare out toward the street. "Filthy Cyclonians. I hate it whenever they darken my doorstep. But customers are customers, and if they want to shop here, we let them." She sighed. "It's better than having them raze our homes to the ground, take it over for factories and other sorts of _zlo hovno_." Expression switching from anger to apologetic, she added, "_Promiňte_, I didn't meant to speak so rudely."

"_Je to v pořádku_. We feel the same way." I smiled widely. "We're really grateful for all your help _Pani Drachova_."

She beamed, and gave me a pat on the shoulder. "Now, I must go help your friends with these as well. Make sure the armour stays in good condition, otherwise it will not be so good in protection."

"I will", I agreed, nodding my head in a part-bow, as the lady bustled away.

As I waited at the counter to pay, Charlotte strode over, extra sass in her hip-sway.

"I look _badass_", she sang, pirouetting to a stop. Her combination choice had been red and black, accompanied with black fingerless gloves that went up to her elbows. She threw me another pair, these in dark blue and with shorter sleeves. Her armour choice apparently had only been one shoulder guard, but with an extra back-guard and a pair of short gauntlets. She'd also managed some time to tap up her mascara, somehow.

"Uh. Wow", I said, grinning.

"I know right!" She flashed a smile back, looking over my outfit. "You look…um."

My shoulders slumped, a puppy-look starting up. Charlotte grimaced.

"You look fine Han, don't do that, it's..it's weird."

"Thanks", I deadpanned. The redhead rolled her eyes, then patted my head. Which was awkward, considering she was shorter than me, even with a new pair of high-heeled biker boots.

Sam walked over then with Mrs Drachova, the teen dressed up in a fab combination of blue and green, with the lightest colours out of our trio. Her gloves were short and not fingerless, but the length was hidden under the medival-like wide sleeves of her top. She'd found her legwarmers, and wrapped them around her new knee-highs. I was starting to feel left out, having chosen combat boots that ended just above my ankle. Like Charlotte, she'd opted for a single shoulder guard, alongside thigh-guards and a belt with several pouches.

"You think those are magical hammerspacey?", I asked, pointing at said pouches. Sam gave them a look, then stuck a hand in one and pulled out the bag of money.

"That'll be a yup", she replied. As Mrs Drachova shuffled around behind the counter, we started counting out money to pay.

"Don't look so worried. You get discount, half-price."

"Um, why?", said Charlotte, with a confused look as Sam handed over the coins necessary.

"_Protože jste roztomilý drazí._" And as she said this, she pinched Charlotte's cheeks. Again. Sam and I held back sniggers as Charlotte went very much pink, and as we were walking back out I got smacked over the back of the head.

"What did she say?"

"Not saying."

"Tell!"

"Nope." Charlotte grunted, smacked me again, then stormed off. Sam watched her go, then said, "You know Mrs Drachova was ginger?"

"Yep."

"Do you think she had a daughter?"

"…Holy crap." We looked over our shoulders back at the shop, my stomach doing a strange flip as ideas bubbled up my head. Then we raced after Charlotte, joining her at our skimmers.

* * *

From Terra Bellasarie, we flew in a roughly Easternly direction. We figured this because the sun was starting to dip behind our backs. Unfortunately, we flew for a very long time through empty skies. And I got bored very, very quickly.

"Are we nearly-"

"NO."

"Are we-"

"NO."

"I see the Condor!"

"NO wait, what?"


	8. Chapter 8 - Switzerland

"I see the Condor!"

"NO wait, what?" Charlotte turned her attention away from me to see where I was pointing. There was the big airship, cruising along several miles closer to us than the horizon. Sam let out a victorious whoop, while I was plain glad to see something familiar that wouldn't try to kill us.

Until Charlotte pointed out the swarm of dots around the airship.

"Talons I guess", she said with a scowl. "Let me at them?"

"It'll probably give a good impression, although it would be better to plan using the benefit of surprise…she's gone anyway, hasn't she?", I muttered, as the redhead rocketed forward, pulling out her bow. What a bloody Leeroy Jenkins. Sam shrugged.

"What can you do?", she said. "I personally would like some payback. You?"

"…Fuck it, let's do this." Hammering my skimmer into overdrive, I joined Sam and Charlotte in tearing toward the Talons and Condor.

"The Condor calls for aid!", I yelled over the wind pressure. "And crazy teenagers will answer!"

"For Narnia!", Sam shouted. I don't know if she heard me. Who cares? We smashed into those Talons like…three pissed-off kids attacking bad guys. Flipping over one, I knocked him off with a chakram swipe.

"I don't have a funny quip!", I yelled after him. "Nah, that doesn't work. SHIT." Pulling up hard, I narrowly avoided crashing into a good guy. Well, good gal. Piper had pulled up sharply too.

"Careful!", she snapped.

"Sorry, not used to flying in close contact", I replied. "6 o'clock!"

She fired behind her Heliscooter, nailing a Talon. Charlotte flew past right after with a scowl.

"That was mine!", the ginger yelled, before shooting after another Talon. Those buggers were learning quickly who to avoid, and scattered like rabbits. Piper looked to me with confusion.

"Is she-"

"A friend of mine. Mostly safe." I hovered in closer to add, "Do not get on her bad side", before heading off, lobbing a chakram as I did. My aim was improving, thank God, although it narrowly missed Finn's face (or as he put it "My gorgeous face!") and only hit the wheel of a Talon skimmer instead of the actual Talon. Put him nicely out of commission though. Sam had managed to start some magnificent teamwork with Junko, using him as a buffer if any recoil occurred when she fired her staff. I don't think he understood it was teamwork, but he was okay with her watching his back. Oddly enough, no sign of

Ah.

Blue twirly of doom right past my face. Gotta be Aerrow. He took out the remainder of the Talons in that one fell swoop before hovering in the middle of the odd mixture of his teammates and strangers.

"Everyone to the Condor", I heard over the intercom on my skimmer. "Including you new guys."

"Gals", I muttered under my breath, going down after Charlotte and Sam to land on the Condor's landing strip. As my wheels hit the track, I suddenly heard the roar of another engine. One last stubborn Talon rocketed over the side. Swinging wildly, I pulled something out of the space under my skimmer's engine core and smacked it into his face, so he went straight down over the side. Charlotte, who'd been closest to me, stared as he vanished before turning to me.

"Dude, Hannah what was that move you pulled?!", she asked in astonishment. Holding up my odd weapon, I had a better look at it.

"Um…reverse psychology!", I replied with a cocky grin, holding up, believe it or not, Charlotte's psychology bag. Her expression became even more surprised.

"That's my psychology", she muttered. "Why do you still have that?!"

"The fuck if I know." I shrugged and hid it back under my engine core.

We parked near the hangar bay doors, as they were still closed. Piper started talking with Stork, who was up on the balcony, and both of them sounded annoyed.

"Look, they're fairly safe. They helped us beat that Talon squad, right?"

"Oh no no no, we don't know anything about them. They could be carrying disease or something."

"Um, ew", Charlotte grimaced. "No we aren't."

"That's what you know!", Stork's voice sounded over our intercoms now. "It may be changing your thoughts, making you crazy. It could be…"

"We don't have mind-worms", I snapped, before adding in a lower tone, "Listen, pal. It's fairly windy out here, my friend is already having a bad hair day and is therefore on a very short fuse. And she makes things _blow up_." There was an awkward pause, before the hangar doors cranked open.

"So um, who exactly are you guys?", Piper asked as we three wheeled our skimmers over.

"I'm Charlotte. This is Sam and Hannah", explained Charlotte, jabbing thumbs in our directions.

"S'up", I called, Sam echoing with a "Hiya!"

Somehow Finn saw three chances, and went for it.

"Hey, ladies", he said with a flirtatious grin, looking toward Charlotte.

"Sorry, I prefer gingers", she replied, grinning just as widely and flipping her hair in a manner that was very much like flipping him off. Unabated, he turned to me.

"Sweet, but no", I told him, patting a shoulder. "Don't even go there."

"Oh, but…" For a moment, he was dismayed, but then he glanced over to Sam.

"Don't make me your third choice!", she snapped, pulling out her staff and bonking him over the head. As he wobbled with a dazed grin, she marched off towards the hangar bay. Piper chuckled at the antics, already parking her Heliscooter indoors. Ah, it was so warm and cozy compared to the windy outdoors, even with our new uniforms. It was a little bit of a bombsite, with some boxes randomly stacked about containing either crystals or skimmer parts.

"I like you guys already", Piper said, nudging Sam with her elbow. The tall brunette shrugged, smiling in return, as the other continued, "I'm Piper by the way. Crystal specialist here. The flirt you knocked was Finn, our sharpshooter."

"I'm Junko!", the Wallop piped up. "I, uh...I'm part of heavy ballistics."

"You hit stuff?", Charlotte 'translated.'

"Only some of the time." We nodded to all in greeting, Sam less so in the case of Finn. It seems that the three or four years extra had changed them slightly in physique. Not anything greater. Piper's hair was longer, so that it included a short ponytail as well. Finn was trying some sort of mullet from the looks of it, and had apparently hit puberty quite well. Nice shoulders. Junko had more muscles, if that was technically possible.

Another roar of engines turned everyone's attention to the bay doors. Just before they shut, a final skimmer skidded between and screeched to a halt just in front of the small crowd.

"That's Aerrow", Piper introduced as the gangly redhead hopped off his skimmer. "He's our leader. And that's Radarr." A chirrup and rush of blue hopped from the side pod, as Radarr settled on Aerrow's shoulder. There was certainly more room on those shoulders, since Aerrow wasn't much of the gangly teenager we recognised from the TV screens.

* * *

_He hit puberty __**really **__well._

* * *

"Wow, dramatic entrance much?", I couldn't help but mutter. "Ow!"

"I think it was brilliant", Charlotte giggled quietly.

"Of course you do." I nursed my arm. Note to self: do not insult even sarcastically possible crushes of Charlotte's. She already looked like little love hearts were glowing above her head.

"I need a bucket", Sam murmured, sensing the oncoming romance.

"Check your magical hammerspace pockets", I replied.

"There's only popcorn. What's the use of that?" Oblivious to our whisperings, Aerrow extended a hand in greeting, one which Charlotte eagerly took.

"That was some cool moves out there", he commented. "Do you guys use any sort of crystals to do that?"

"I'm gonna say no", Piper jumped in. "None of your weapons were crystal-powered, apart from Sam's staff."

"It's because we're elementals", Charlotte explained, grinning smugly. "We control the very make-up of the world itself. I am a wielder of fire and earth. Hannah and Sam do the other stuff."

"Cheers", Sam muttered flatly.

"In expansion of that, I control water and air, and Sam has a little mix of all four", I added.

"Nothing to do with the band Elementals though."

"That. Is so. RAD!", Finn suddenly shouted.

"Tell me about", said Aerrow. "So, no crystals at all. You literally control the elements."

"Hell yeah!" And as demonstration, Charlotte set her hands on fire and clapped, the streams of fire winding around herself and exploding in the shape of a phoneix. As the Storm Hawks ducked behind hands in protection of sparks, I showered a thin spray of water from a bottle over any stray flames, making sure Charlotte wasn't touched. Sam. Well. Stared and commented, "Oooh, pretty sparks."

"Uh. Wow", murmured Aerrow as he looked back up. "Those were some serious fireworks."

"And I can set them off any time", Charlotte smirked.

"Whoa, I dunno about that", Piper intervened, stepping up between the two gingers. "Perhaps any demonstrations of insane and unworldly power should be kept for the outdoors."

"You'd better not have scorched the hangar!", Stork shouted over the comms-system. Why didn't he just come down and see for himself? No-one and nothing had been touched. Radarr looked a little shaken up mind, ducked down behind Sam's back.

Charlotte stepped around Piper, focus on Aerrow instead of everything else. "Well, maybe we should step outside?"

"If you can do anything bigger or better than that, it'd certainly be cool to see", said Aerrow. Finn waved from the background, adding, "I want front-row seats!"

"Oh honey", Charlotte spoke quietly to Aerrow. "You have no idea what I can do."

"Bucket", I whispered to Sam. "Now. Please?!"

"Okaaaay." And Piper was in between them again. "Fireworks can be saved for later, I'm sure. For now, we'd rather you tell us how you managed to get those powers? And what were you doing just outside Cyclonian territory?"

"Yeah, yeah, Sam and Han can handle that", Charlotte waved the other aside. Piper was looking increasingly angry, and I could sense a feud about to kick off. Glancing back at Sam, about to request someone to stop the fight, I saw her sitting on the floor with a handful of popcorn.

"…Really?", I questioned.

"Hey, I found a use for the popcorn", Sam said, Radarr popping his head around and sneaking some of the salty treat. Rolling my eyes, I just sat down beside her and joined in.

During this time I'd missed most of the argument, which had evolved into full-blown shouting. I didn't tune into the words, seeing as half of it was swearing and half of it was Piper. Finn and Junko crept around behind Sam and I, the blonde sneaking a hand of the magically-appearing popcorn.

"Hannah! Sam! Back me up here!", Charlotte demanded, spinning around to glare at us.

"Switzerland", we chorused.

"Dammit!"

"Maybe if we could calm down." Sorry Aerrow, you didn't have much of a chance. The shouting restarted, and might have gone on for longer if not for-

_HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK._

The Condor's foghorn split the air, silencing all. Apart from an obnoxious _crunch_ of popcorn from the onlookers.

A very ticked-off Stork stood at the entrance to the hangar.

"Thank you!", he snapped, before returning back to the helm. Finn and Junko were close behind, myself and Sam following. Radarr scampered back to Aerrow, who found it a good idea also to bid a hasty retreat. Piper went behind, and Charlotte was last, glaring ominously at the crystal mage.

Whose hair started smoking.

Seeing the oncoming fire hazard, I set off a fire-alarm in the corridor, spraying a fine mist of water everywhere and causing everyone to groan as they were soaked. Apologising quietly, I switched the waterworks back off. Meanwhile, Charlotte was a touch gobsmacked.

"Did I just set her hair on fire with my mind?", she asked.

"Um, yes, I think?", I replied, peeling away the layer of moisture stuck to my uniform.

"…Sam, I need a target."

"Hell fuck no!" Too late. Metal vines wrapped around my feet, and Charlotte grinned gleefully. Already I could feel heat blossoming on my head.

Thank Above for Wallops and their strength though, and impeccable timing. Junko wrapped an arm around me and yanked. Sam looked fairly dismayed as the vines creaked and snapped. I grimaced (my ankles almost popped). And Charlotte was even more pissed.

"Agh. Thanks Junko", I gasped as he set me back down, pulling air into my lungs and rubbing ash off my head.

"Don't you ever think of fighting back?", he asked. "It's not exactly nice of them to pick on you."

"Dude, I've had worse. Charlotte just turns up the heat if you fight back. And rule one is: no-one hits Sam", I explained. "She's…special?"

"Special special?"

"No, just special. Like unique. Rare. One-of-a-kind."

"Special", Charlotte chimed in, popping between Junko and I before skipping ahead to catch up with Aerrow. We watched her go, before I added, "Now Charlotte-"

"Not a good idea", Sam quickly broke in, pushing me onward and away from Junko, who looked outright confused.


	9. Chapter 9 - Overheating

On the bridge, everyone spread out around the centre table, leaving Stork to his space in the helm. Considering he was giving anyone and everyone a death stare if they came too close, I'm not surprised. Our trio plopped down on the couch seats, with Aerrow sitting opposite us and Piper standing behind him. Junko peeled away to fix some pipes in the corner, and Finn sat just next to him tuning up his guitar. I kept staring at the instrument, not getting why it was called a guitar when it had only four strings. Wouldn't it be a bass then?

Charlotte knocked me on the head, and I twisted back around in my seat with an awkward shrug.

"First off: how did you get those crazy powers?", Aerrow asked.

"And where can we get them too?", Finn piped up.

"Uh…let's go from the top", Charlote explained. "We, by which I mean Han and I, got our powers from Hecate, who is a goddess of magic where we come from-"

"We're not from around", I butted in.

"That much is fairly clear", Piper commented. Charlotte gave her a dull sneer.

I continued, "There was a problem with realities, ours and yours in fact overlapped, and we were dropped here as a result. Or rather, we walked over the thresholds. It was less of an accident and more a problem of curiosity."

"After which we got involved in a serious mess that knocked off a chain of events that led us here", Sam finished that explanation off.

"And the powers?", Aerrow brought the subject back around.

"Yes, Hecate granted us control in our dimension, whilst with Sam she was hit by a crossover of all the elements and so absorbed minor control over them. And apparently, in your dimension, these powers have been amplified", Charlotte said.

"So…we can't get them too."

"I'm gonna say no", I replied to Finn, leaning back over the couch. Screw it, it was comfortable like this. And no amount of Charlotte poking my head was going to turn me back around.

"It was pretty nice of you guys to help out with those Cyclonians", said Piper. "Although, I couldn't help but notice your skimmers were of a similar design."

"Yeah, what's with the Switchblades?", Aerrow asked with a frown. "Going by your story you're definetely not sky knights of any kind, so it would have been hard to get your hands on skimmers without the ability to fly." He paused, then questioned, "Unless you can fly?"

Sam and Charlotte looked at me.

"Never tried. Never been in a situation that demanded it", I replied, raising my hands.

"But for the record", Charlotte added. "- we're willing to try."

"So you can't fly, making it nigh impossible to travel between terras, which would be very messy if you ended up on somewhere uninhabitated-"

"Or the Black Gorge!"

We froze at the sound of Stork, who'd appeared out of nowhere.

"…Yes, or the Black Gorge", Piper continued, a little off with her list being so abruptly disrupted. "And somehow you manage to commandeer not one but three Cyclonian skimmers, along with Fuel crystals, and gain weapons which are nothing like those used by Cyclonians. Not to mention impressive paint-jobs. So how did you manage that?"

"Well, we've been here a couple weeks at least", Charlotte told her. "Most of that time we spent being trained-"

"Are you sure we should be talking about that?", I jumped in. "I mean, we've been mistaken for spies before. And we've just had an upgrade to get around this situation."

"Well, it seems the 'upgrade' didn't pull through. Besides, we've already explained things from the beginning", said Charlotte, before turning back to Piper and Aerrow. "But yeah, we spent two weeks being trained in Cyclonia."

"WHAT?!" The multiple outbursts echoed from all around the bridge. Aerrow was on his feet pretty sharpish, and I somehow managed to face-plant over the side of the couch, after being startled by the outburst.

"Ow."

"That doesn't necessarily mean we're with the Cyclonians!", Sam quickly shouted. "If anything we hate their guts. We just needed the training so we could actually survive in this reality."

"Where we come from, people don't have to fly between random hunks of ground that grow into the sky", Charlotte elaborated. "When we first arrived, yes, it was on a random terra, and yes, we got into trouble."

"We got hauled onto a fighter by the Dark Ace", I mumbled, pulling myself back to my feet. "He was, safe to say, extremely unpleasant."

"Isn't he always", Aerrow commented, nodding in agreement as he sat back down again.

"After which, we managed to persuade Master Cyclonis that since we had extra power and all, it could be useful of her to have us as Talons", Sam continued. "However, we were never planning on joining proper: we were waiting for the best chance to get our gear and high-tail it out of there."

"Our chance turned up when we got out on patrol and Murk Raiders tried to ambush our lot", Charlotte added. "I basically kicked butt."

"And then we got lost."

"Then went shopping."

"Got lost again."

"Which led us to go wander and bump into you guys", Sam completed.

"Any questions?", I asked with a friendly grin.

Silence.

"Certainly a detailed tale", Piper said. "But we can't be sure we can trust you."

"Look, whatever you want us to do that will lead you guys to trust us, we'll do it", I said. Well, with limits of course. Because Stork looked ready to suggest dropping us off in the Black Gorge. "We're not with the Cyclonians. We're just looking for a way, if possible, to actually survive out here. Or maybe get back home."

"Why?!", Charlotte yelled at me. I jumped back, wary of possible firebombs.

"Because we don't belong here?!", was my retaliation. "Because it's not like we can stay with the Storm Hawks forever. Eventually we'll either be dropped off maybe on Atmosia or some other inhabited terra, or we'll have to find a way to get back home."

"No place like home", Sam added. Charlotte looked positively downfallen.

"But…I don't wanna go home."

It seemed like the sudden drop in mood had spread out to the rest of the bridge. Even Finn's background playing had stopped. Eventually, Aerrow cleared his throat, and suggested, "Well maybe, if everyone else would be alright with this, you guys could stay on the Condor until we find some way to get this reality business sorted."

"While at some other time I would have never believed the sort of tale you three presented", Piper said. "This time, I'm going to take a chance and agree with Aerrow."

"Three more chicks onboard! I'm in!" At least Finn could be relied upon to easily stay within character. Mostly.

"You guys sure you have enough room?", I said. "We can double-bunk if needs be."

"I dunno about spare rooms", said Piper, heading for the door off the bridge. "I'll go check."

"Thank you!", Sam called after her. Charlotte was quiet. I frowned, leaning closer to the ginger and giving her a cautious poke.

"You want some alone time?", I asked.

"I can go down to the hangar bay, it's cool." As Charlotte left the bridge too, I spotted Aerrow watching her leave. When his gaze shifted down back to Sam and I, my face was set in a deadpan look. He frowned. I raised an eyebrow.

"What?"

"Just go after her already!"

"But didn't she say-"

"By Above the lass has a biggest crush on you in Atmos! If you go after her, she'll be happier." Mulling over my thoughts, I added, "Please?"

After a pause, Aerrow left at a faster walk. Sam glanced at me.

"Do you think it was okay to tell him that?"

"So long as they get together faster, I don't care. Lass needs cute huggles and if our hero is the best one to provide them then he bloody well will."

* * *

So?

_Okay…so I guess I should probably explain what happened huh?_

**YES! **

_Wow, okay…surround sound…switch off please._

* * *

_So I was standing there, being hot and all fiery and I let loose a draconic shape of fire, the best one I've EVER pulled off. At which point, I felt someone behind me._

_"Hannah, I'm not in the mood. Fuck off…please"_

_"Not Hannah." The hair on the back of my neck rose and I took a deep breath. Aerrow. Was. Behind me._

_Okay, fan-girl moment over._

_"Oh, hey," I said as I extinguished my fiery dragonlet and turned to look at him, crossing my arms over my chest._

* * *

WHY?

_I went into defence mode. For all I knew he was coming to tell me that I had to leave but that you two could stay. Damn that would have sucked._

Not like we'd have let that happen anyway.

* * *

_"Hey…so, can I ask what's wrong?" He stepped up closer to me, and I sighed before turning around and sitting on the floor._

_"Well, sit down this could take a while…and this is the short version." _

* * *

_Okay girls, I love you so don't get offended by any of this okay?_

Okay

**Promise**

* * *

"_About 3 years ago, I found out I had these crazy ass powers. I felt so alone. Until I found Han crying in a corner saying she'd flooded the bathroom because she kicked the toilet – don't laugh!"_

_"Sorry." Aerrow said trying to hide his smile,_

_"Anyway, for about a year or so things were good, we stuck together, saved the world once or twice. And then Sami happened to get caught in the cross fire and absorb some of my 'level up' to put it simply…after that I guess I've just started to feel redundant…I mean Sam can do what I can do, so why am I still around? Her and Hannah get on so well, and I love them both, but I'm not needed, so me just disappearing wouldn't be a bad thing…just becoming a ghost. _

_"The thing with those girls is that at home, they have people waiting for them. Me, not so much; my mum isn't fussed if I don't come home, my sister loves it when I'm not. No boyfriend, no friends that can't replace me within a day, maybe two. My dad's an arse who left, showed up, left, got re-married, left again, he broke promises and treated us as weapons, not his own flesh and blood. My elements can be given to someone else, someone who won't use them on their friends, someone who actually means something and is worth a damn…not some short-ass, ginger teenager who has a bad temper and hits first, asks questions later._

_"But being here…I feel useful, yes I know that most of my time here has been one huge lie but I've been trained, I've helped. I got a kick-ass bike that I adore and this may sound stupid, but it feels like home. And being with you…well." I paused, stammered, then thought 'Fuck it'. _

_"I…I…Ah what the hell? I've had like the biggest fan girl crush on you for years back home. You were always my favourite, so strong and heroic and I'm gonna shut up now cause you're staring at me." _

_I felt that my face had flamed up whist expressing my weirdness and tendency to fall in love with fictional characters. Aerrow didn't seem to notice, or if he did he didn't say anything. He reached out to brush away a tear that I hadn't even noticed had fallen from my eyes._

_"You are needed." He looked right at me when he said, and I felt my heart give out, the dam broke, the flood gates opened and I cried._

* * *

You cried?

_Yeah_

Like…actual tears?

_Hannah I'm not incapable of crying you know! So yes, actual tears._

**Then what?**

* * *

_He pulled me into a hug and waited until I stopped._

_"I can't really say anything on what's happened to you in your own world, but what I can tell you is that anyone who doesn't want you around is an idiot. I've only known you like what? Two hours? And already being apart from you feels weird. You're magnetic, you just draw attention, and I want to be around you. I like the sound of your voice…It's pretty to listen too, and I'm sure that if you were to tell me a story, I'd be able to see it exactly as it should be. You have so much expression…it's beautiful. You're…" He trailed off as I looked up at him._

_"Beautiful" He whispered._

* * *

_And that's all I'm telling you._

…

**Han?**

Sorry I teared up there at the end. Aw sweetie-

_Nah. Save it. Come on, continue with the rest of the story, right?_

Ah, yes. Of course.

* * *

"My romance senses are tingling", Sam commented, sitting up straight on the couch.

"Good or bad?", I called over from sitting next to Finn. She flashed a thumbs-up, and I grinned. "Sorry. Anyway, you were saying you write, like, all your pieces?"

"Pretty much", said Finn, strumming his guitar. "I like to cover other guitarists too, like the Sky Shakers and Heavy Terra..." My blank look caused him to trail off, and have to explain, "They're all heavy rock bands. Just like my tunes." And as an example, he let loose a wailing riff. While there was talent there, I couldn't help but wince from being in close proximity to the higher notes.

"Uh, wow!", I said, rubbing one of my ears. "That's pretty cool."

"Has it stopped?" Sam glared over the side of the couch at Finn, who grinned awkwardly.

"Thank Atmos", muttered Stork. "Who needs ear-rot when you've got that playing in the background?"

"Excuse you! Whose amazing skills of rock and roll took down Ravess' machine of doom?", Finn snapped back.

"…You. But who is it that gets the team anywhere as _pilot of the Condor_? And fitted her out with multiple deadly booby-traps." Stork's calm matter-of-fact tone of the last sentence very much sold it. Sam and I just grinned at each other as Finn face-palmed in defeat.

"Exactly", said Stork with a smug smile. "Me."

Leaving the couch, Sam wandered closer to the helm, staring at the dials and brass spheres. She reached out to poke the glass orb with the rotating wheels, but Stork idly smacked her hand away.

"No touching", he said bluntly. Guesses are that he'd dealt with similar behaviour beforehand.

"What exactly are these for?", Sam asked, pointing (but making sure not to touch) at the dials. Stork gave her a brief judging look, before starting, "That dial there measures outer air pressure of the hull. If it gets into the wiggly red zone, it means we're ten seconds away from being crushed by the very air we breath. Now this dial, that shows how much power left in Fuel crystals in the hull. If it gets to the blue zone, we're about to drop out of the sky. As for this dial…"

"Measures temperature in the engine?", Sam butted in.

"…Good guess. Since you're right. And if it gets to the red zone-"

"We go boom."

"…We have eight seconds _before_ we go boom."

"Much doom abounds", Sam commented with a grin.

"Much doom indeed."

A _bvvvm_ of a door opening announced the return of Piper.

"How goes the room arrangements?", Finn asked, adding quietly, "Please let it be sharing."

"We have one spare. Technically Starling's room, but if people are okay with that, then it should be fine", explained Piper.

"I can bunk on the floor if needs be", I said, while Sam jumped in, "Shotgun bed."

"Guess that means I get the sofa", commented Charlotte, as she wandered in from…somewhere. Not quite sure where, but somewhere. She definetely looked happier than when she left, and Aerrow was just behind her. Sam and I exchanged a glance, then looked over to Charlotte.

"…Stop it!", she whined, hiding behind a sudden blush.

"Success", I muttered, throwing a wave at Aerrow who also suddenly seemed preoccupied with his hair and an interesting part of the ceiling. Finn didn't miss this.

"Dude. Are you trying to hook those two up?", he whispered to me.

"Yup."

"Smooth. Do you think-"

"No."

"Damnit."

"Don't even look at me Finn", Sam commented, walking right past us without a second glance. "Otherwise I will hit you. Again."

"I suggest a fist instead of the staff", added Piper. "It hurts more."

"Why is every woman in Atmos out to get me?!", Finn cried.

"'Cause you're a flirtatious idiot?", Charlotte suggested. Silence. Then almost everyone nodding in general agreement. Finn's shoulders slumped over, and I patted his head.

"Hey. It's okay. Someday you'll find someone", I told him. "Eventually."

"Or something", Charlotte added. "Maybe a rock-"

"Shush. We don't want to hurt him", I snapped, pushing Charlotte away. She grinned widely.

"Ooh, defensive. That must mean you like him", she commented. Finn looked hopeful.

"Wha-I-just-n-no. Not my type. I just don't want his feelings to be bruised", I retorted.

"Yeah, whatev."

"Do you guys maybe want to carry out whatever argument's coming up in a different room?", Sam suggested, now pushing us both toward the door, calling a "Sorry!" over her shoulder.

"Uh, no problem?", replied Aerrow.

"Looks like something went on down there below?", I said with a sly grin.

"Oh God Hannah that was bad phrasing", Sam muttered. I chuckled awkwardly. Charlotte meanwhile was going more red than normal.

"I-ah-just-no words for you guys!"

"Ooh, defensive", I snarked. "That must mean you really like him."

"A) not defensive, and B) duuuuh!"

"So what happened already?!"

* * *

_Yeah, we've already had this bit. Moving on:_

While it felt a little awkward to be using Starling's room, I found it very zen. Purple was calming, and the whole room was covered in that colour. Everyone made sure not to touch the mosquito-repellent lightbulb.

Charlotte had just finished explaining the goings-on in the hangar bay, perched on the bed next to Sam and me seated on the floor hugging my (loaned) pillow.

"That. Was. Adorable", I murmured, grinning widely. "What else happened?"

"Nope, not saying", replied Charlotte. As I whined in disappointment, she stood and stretched. "It's getting late, and I have a meeting with a sofa. G'night."

"G'night", Sam and I chorused as Charlotte wandered out. I'd just about gotten comfortable on the floor when the door reopened and my pillow suddenly vanished, causing me to smack my head on the floor.

"Thank you sweetie!", Charlotte called, casually hitting me in the face with the pillow and walking out the door again. I stared blankly after her and muttered, "I hate that girl sometimes."

"Love you too!"

"And that's just creepy. Don't you think that's-" I pouted. Sam had already hit the hay and zonked out. Curling up on the floor, I stayed there for two-point-seven seconds before ruffling up my blanket into a nest and snuffling down in that.

Then I slept.

End of story.

* * *

_WHAT._

Metaphorically. End of the day.

_Oh._


	10. Chapter 10 - Condor-cleaning

Day Two on the Condor. I woke to an extremely grumbling stomach, and remembered the three of us had technically skipped dinner.

This may have been a good thing when I opened the door and the eggy smell that hit me caused me to rapidly close it again.

"What the hell was that?", Sam mumbled, slowly waking up from the pong.

"Either Cyclonia has turned to chemical warfare, or Junko made curry for dinner last night", I muttered, coughing to clear my lungs. "You could pretty much see the green gas wafting around."

"Damn. Now I'm extra pissed."

The sounds of rapid footsteps and the door sliding open caught our attention, and whoever dashed through had to duck from a double blast of air to block the smell from coming in.

"Morning to you too", Charlotte dead-panned.

"You smelt it?", I asked. "Wait, rhetorical question. Clearly you did."

"Yeah. I was gonna flame it, but then I decided not to blow up the Condor", Charlotte muttered, sitting herself on my nest.

"That would have definetely cut our stay short", commented Sam. "Did it get to the bridge?"

"Nah. But it's in pretty much all of the corridors."

"…You do know-", I started, shuffling backwards from Charlotte, but she jumped in first:

"Oh fuck sake's why do you think I went to you guys?" Blank looks. Charlotte face-palmed. "Air-controllers. Ring any bells?"

"We aren't dealing with gas until we're fully awake", Sam said. "Also we may have to sort you out first."

Charlotte went very, very pale.

"Oh fuck no. Get it off, get it off, get it off, get it off….now! Please?" She got twin breezes reverse-hoovering her, knocking off all traces of the smell.

"There you go", I said, grinning happily. "Fresh as a daisy." Oddly, that got a glare.

"Fresh as a black rose", Sam said, and apparently that was an improvement.

Then there was another knock at the door. Frowning at each other, Charlotte went to open the door and Sam and I prepped more air blasts.

_Bvvm._

YOINK

_HWOSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSH._

_Bvvm._

"Oh…kay?" Piper patted down her disheveled hair, as well as flicked aside the clothes peg she'd been using as an impromptu gas-mask. "I guess you guys noticed as well."

"Yup", was the dead-pan thrice-chorus.

"Any of the boys up?", Sam asked.

"Stork's at the helm. I didn't ask where he had the deep-pressure suit from. Haven't seen anyone else?"

"We were about to head out to try clearing this out", I said, starting to put away the blankets from the floor. "How did this happen?"

"One of Junko's meals. He liked it…a little too much I think", explained Piper, grimacing with her last words.

"Ew", muttered Charlotte. "Like, major ew."

"You got any more clothes pegs?", I asked.

Some of that morning was spent shooting out air gusts and knocking balls of Wallop-gas out of windows and air-locks. By the time that was finished, everyone else was up, with all bar Junko looking a little pale or sickly. Stork had hidden the deep-pressure suit (which we assume looked like a deep-sea diving suit) and made breakfast. Which was a nice reminder to start my stomach rumbling once more. Even when I saw what breakfast was.

"Merbian cabbage."

Silence. A couple of the Storm Hawks were already eating, if slowly. Sam muttered, "Merbian cabbage", again, then stood and headed for the kitchen.

"Uh, no offense meant", I said. "We don't have this stuff on Earth."

"Whatcha doing Sam?", Charlotte called after the tall brunette.

"Making waffles!"

"What?", asked Finn, as did I, and Aerrow, and Stork.

"You didn't know Sam could make waffles?", Charlotte spoke to me.

"Apparently not." Waffles sounded very, very, very nice right now. And already the boys were calling numbers they wanted.

Post breakfast, and we realised that life on the Condor wasn't just swanning around waiting for the next plot to appear. There were jobs to be done, if not many, and those without jobs tended to take up training with each other. Elemental manipulation here managed to provide some aid.

Sam spent about half an hour with Junko and Finn at various points throughout the ship. Pipes seemed to burst on a regular basis (considering she was a fairly old airship, I wasn't too surprised) so no-one made too much of a fuss, especially when the only thing that escaped was steam. According to Finn, the job usually took about an hour or two, depending on how many pipes were acting up, but with heat and air control able to trap the steam and meld pipes in place, the job took a fair quicker time.

A panel on the outside of the Condor had manged to be decently hammered at during the last dogfight, and Charlotte volunteered to take care of it. Again, heat made a good melder, but the only real trouble was doing it while the Condor was still flying. Ever the determinator, Charlotte attached a line of rope between the landing platform and herself, and basically jumped to one of the manouvering engines, where the panel had been dislocated. She returned utterly dishevelled, but with a triumphant grin and one fixed engine cover.

I went a little anti-dirt crazy, finding layers of dust in random corners and proceeding to sweep them onto the floor. Usually that worked at home, since I had a hoover there, but I couldn't find something that acted the same. So when Sam popped her head into the corridor, I was standing in the middle of a thin sea of dust.

"Wow", she said. "I just – wow. What in Merlin's name did you do?"

"I didn't do it", I replied quickly. "I was trying to clean. And hoovering doesn't exist."

"In which case, we do this the 'old-fashioned way'. Find a mop and bucket. Or two."

Finding mops and buckets, we filled them up with water and started to work when Aerrow entered the corridor. He froze at the sight of us with mops, and Sam shouted "Think fast", chucking him a bucket. Which he just about caught before snagging the mop I lobbed at him.

"Sorry", I called.

"Uh, it's fine?", he replied, shuffling the items in his hands.

"If you're fine, then you can help out", said Sam. "This is a long corridor, and only two of you."

"Yeah…wait, SAM!" Too late. She was gone. Pouting angrily, I started throwing globules of water down the corridor. Aerrow made to head away, but after a pause for thought he started helping out.

About ten minutes in, we'd managed to clean up a quarter of the corridor, working outwards from our starting spot. I'd ditched my shoes and now was having a hell of time by skidding around on the wet floor, propelled by my mop. Passing an open door, I spotted Finn and shouted, "Dude!"

"Yeah?"

"Wanna help? We have a water slide. Sort of." As if on cue, Aerrow slid past with a "Whoop!"

It worked. Pretty soon Junko had been roped into the cleaning, Radarr was skidding around on top of a bucket, and Piper had stuck her head out of her room to ask what the fuss was and promptly joined. Now we had everyone bar three in the corridor (how did we fit? It was a _very _long corridor), with a handful actually cleaning and the rest sliding about or playing mop-hockey. As I picked up a puddle of water for bringing it back to a bucket, Charlotte reappeared.

"So this is where everyone is!", she said in a tone of surprise. "I was wondering why no-one was in the hanga- ooh, water slide."

"Gangway!", I yelled down the corridor, dropping the water and using it to shove various items to the side. Discarding her shoes, Charlotte took a run up and skidded down the corridor, shrieking, "BANZAI!" Piper hopped back, Finn and Junko somehow did an archway, Radarr was still on his bucket, Sam narrowly missed dropping her waffles as she poked her head in, and Aerrow was still mopping…

We saw it coming before it actually happened.

He looked up, she spotted him, flailed, unisoned cries of alarm and one wet _smack_.

Falling on top of him, their faces pressed together in a sudden and awkward kiss. Charlotte's face went redder than her hair, no, Aerrow's hair. Not that he wasn't just as surprised. I just about saw this as I followed behind Charlotte, using the water to brake in a more controlled manner. Sam looked gobsmacked.

Breaking apart, Charlotte spoke first, mumbling quietly, "So, um…hi?"

"Hi?", Aerrow echoed in a similar tone of surprise.

"Dude, way to go!", Finn broke the rest of the silence. "Nice score!" I burst into laughter, with Piper and Finn joining in and adding whoops. Charlotte hurried to scramble off Aerrow, but the water made her slip again and she fell on his chest once more. Cue more awkward mumbles, with Aerrow helping her off and standing, Charlotte clinging onto his shoulder to balance herself.

"Waffle?", Sam asked, casually sliding the plate in front of them. Charlotte snagged one as she walked away briskly, slipping off the corridor as soon as possible through the first door.

"Uh, Charlotte, that's Aerrow's room", Piper called after her.

"I knew that", she called back, jumping back out with even redder cheeks and almost jogging out of the next door. Aerrow was still, mostly like running through the event that had just happened.

"How was that, lover-boy?", I asked him.

"Uh…That was..." As a quirky smile crept onto his face, I grinned widely.

"That's good ta hear, laddie." Patting his shoulder, I water-skated down in the direction of the hangar bay.

Getting my shoes back on once I'd made sure my feet were dry, I hopped over to my skimmer, figuring I should get some flight practise in the day. What I wasn't expecting though was for something to _bang_ a small hole in the hangar bay doors, whizz past the top of my head as I ducked sharpish, and embed itself in the wall of the hangar.

"The frag?", I muttered, firstly darted over to peep through the hangar doors and see who or what had fired the thing. All I could see was the shape of a retreating skimmer.

"Ah. Fucker." Loosing interest, I headed over to the small dent in the wall and yanked out a copper ball about the size of my fist. It turned out to be a messenger capsule thing, hollow and holding a slip of paper.

"Y'know, could've just posted it. Like a normal person", I snarked to myself as I finished reading it. "But noooo, you have to be dramatic. And nearly knock my bloody head off too." Since I already had a Fuel crystal prepped in my skimmer's engine, I tucked the letter into a pocket and started up the engine, punching a button on the wall to open the hangar doors.

"Stupid. Egotistical", I mumbled, revving the engine with each word. "Evil. AttraNO! Fuck's sake. And curiousity, fuck that thingy too." And I bailed, taking off to follow the directions on the letter.

* * *

_Hannah?_

**Hannah?**

_Where the fuck is bitchface?_

**Don't know.**

_…You know what this means?_

**Mind-worms?**

_You've been hanging with him too long. No._

**She's been kidnapped by Cyclonians?**

_Nah. She probably went to pee._

**What then?**

_We get to narrate._

**Awesome.**

_Yeah._

* * *

_On the Condor, the corridor had been dried up and mops put away. I was mostly hiding out on the balcony in front of the bridge, part day-dreaming and part running-through-_those_-few-seconds. And thinking 'God I'm such an idiot'. Way to blow the cover to the rest of the Storm Hawks. Unless they just thought it was an accident...Hell no they wouldn't think that was _just_ an accident. _

_"Charlotte?"_

_"I HAVE- oh, hi." I turned quickly away from Aerrow, my cheeks going red again. He placed a hand on my shoulder, smiling softly._

_"You okay?"_

_"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."_

_"You sure?"_

_"No." Oh crap. I'd not meant to say that. "I mean yep, totally."_

_He leant on the balcony rail next to me, joining me in staring absent-mindedly into space._

_"You're um.." Oh God. "That is." What was he gonna say? "I dunno." Say it. "You're…" FUCKING SAY IT. "You're a good kisser."_

_"WhadaIum." My cheeks were on fire. Again. Goddamit. "Thanks? You too? I think? I haven't had much experience in that field but I CRAP." Seriously Charlotte you're so articulate. Dropping my head into my hands, I let out an embarassed squeal, at which Aerrow burst into chuckles. I couldn't deal with this anymore, and turned to run, but his hand on my shoulder stopped me._

_"I was wondering though…" My stomach was so tight from nerves, yet filled with butterflies. Oddly enough, his face had some blush in it as well, as if he was nervous as well. "…do you want to make our relationship official?"_

_Oh my God. Oh my Gods and Goddesses and Hekate above and – I squealed loudly now, burying my head in his chest as I hugged him tightly._

_"Um, is this a bad-"_

_"Yes yes YES!" Calming down slightly, I patted down my hair and stood back. We were both sporting wide grins now. "That is, um, I agree with making our relationship official. And stuff."_

Taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptatap

_Looking up, I saw Sam, squashed against the huge window of the bridge. Finn and Junko was right behind her, enthusiastic expressions being replaced with 'oh crap' looks. Sam was banging on the glass, with…was that her phone? In her hand? _

_I raised my fist, quickly combusting it. Next to me, I could see Aerrow raising a sword and lighting it up in blue, despite a not-so-serious smile. Finn and Junko absconded with great haste, leaving Sam to fall slowly backwards taking one last photo. Smiling with the satisfaction of a job well done, we looked back at each other and Aerrow leaned forward and kissed me on the lips. _

* * *

**That was too close.**

_No really though why didn't you run away straight off?_

**I was being crushed. By a _Wallop_. And an over-eager Finn.**

_Fair enough._


	11. Chapter 11 - Nightmares

**The second night came around with a proper dinner that this time that we didn't skip, although for some reason Hannah wasn't hungry. Mind you, we don't really know because she never showed up. **

_Bitch._

**Anyway, we had a more edible dinner of pancakes with purple duraberries. I could sense a pattern, despite having only done two meals: we were gonna be eating sugary stuff while on the Condor. Unless someone pulled out pasta or something similar to it. **

**Afterwards, we all turned in. I was out of it before Hannah got back to our bunk-room. **

* * *

_Lucky._

**What?**

_At least you slept well for the most part._

* * *

_On the bridge, I sat up trying not to scream, and in the process I ended up head-butting the person sitting on the sofa next to me. As I rubbed my forehead with a grimace, I realised the victim was Aerrow. Shiiitshitshitshit._

_"Okay, ow."_

_"Oh Aerrow, I'm sorry. Wait, why are you sitting on the sofa when I'm trying to sleep anyway?"_

_"I was in the kitchen, and you sounded like you were having a bad dream, so I came to check on you and then the whole head-butting thing happened…"_

_There was silence for a moment, before a lamp flicked on beside me. Aerrow was now crouched down in front me, wearing a frown of concern. He brushed a stray piece of hair off my face before asking, "What happened?"_

_"It was dark, but there was a red haze. I was standing on a hill. I looked down and saw the worlds on fire, all of them. I saw Hannah and Sam, fighting side by side. I saw you guys, I watched you burn. I watched everything burn, and then I could feel it, it felt so real. I watched as you guys, both dead and alive turned towards me, and slowly set me on fire…I was killed by the one thing I thought I'd never have to worry about I felt the smoke in my lungs begin to suffocate me", I explained, no expression in my voice. Every time I blinked, I could see flashes from the nightmare I'd had, and they sent cold shivers up my spine. _

_Aerrow had moved once again to sit beside me, he pulled me into him and we sat there for a while before he said,"Stand up for a second." _

_I stood up and he crawled onto the sofa, taking my hand and pulling me back. I pulled the blanket over the both of us and turned towards him._

_"Thank you." I kissed him on the cheek before snuggling up to him and falling back into a nightmare-free sleep, safe and warm. _

* * *

**And you're upset about _that?!_**

_Creepy dreams, man! And I kinda headbutted him. In the face. His perfect, gorgeous face._

**Ah. That's…nice, sweetie.**

* * *

**Things were showing no sign of settling down once day four swung around. Day three had been a hassle of training, Charlotte firing flame loops and pulling off loop-de-loop on fire (so, same thing really). She'd also tried to imitate Aerrow's electric blue-corkscrew-of-death, but that doesn't really work with one driver on a skimmer, especially in mid-air. Junko caught her and I caught her skimmer. I meanwhile tried to pull of the 'Lightning Claw', despite the difference in choice of weapons. It was…mildly successful? I brought down a good lightning strike from miniature storm clouds, but at the same time the recoil knocked me back down into my skimmer. **

**We were getting trained in the more casual fighting style of the Storm Hawks, which showed real difference from the regimental training of Cyclonia. For one, we actually got to sleep in. I was getting better crystal training from Piper, who showed similar curiousity to crystal combinations. She had the kit to stop stuff from blowing up too much; a great benefit to all. **

**Charlotte was getting more training with Aerrow (at least that's what they said they were doing **_SAM!_**) seeing as their fighting styles were surprisingly similar: get in peoples faces and kick butt a.k.a. short range hand-to-hand. This was if you left out Charlotte's archery. She preferred flaming up her hands and bringing out the punches, much like Aerrow's dual short-swords. **

**In group training, we learnt how to play keep-away. Well, we learnt how to play keep-away several miles in the air. It's kinda like quidditch but without the snitch or bludgers (unless you counted Junko). I was terrible to start off with (my hand-eye co-ordination is pretty much none-existent) but by the end I was doing just as well as everyone else and even adding tricks on my skimmer to confuse the others (which resulted in me becoming very dizzy). For a while, Charlotte wasn't doing very well either as she couldn't keep her eyes off a certain someone but, after the third time of being hit in the head, her competitive streak kicked in and she kicked butt. The funny thing was, Aerrow was exactly the same. At one point, Finn dropped the crystal target ball thingy and both Aerrow and Charlotte careened for it. Everyone seemed to wince, sensing an impact, but it never happened. Instead, they both appeared to high-five, clasping their hands around the ball. As their skimmers began circling around the spot, I could see them arguing, "You let go." "No, you let go." **

**Couples.**

**And then suddenly Charlotte had broken off, with Aerrow holding the ball over his head with a triumphant grin. Laughing, he leaned across and kissed her cheek, to which she smiled and punched his shoulder gently. As I cruised down, I asked, "Dude, what happened?"**

**"He winked." **

**That pretty much explained everything.**

**When people weren't training, they tended to be finding something to do. Charlotte and I still got roped into pipe fixing whenever possible; not that it was a bad thing. Charlotte was improving her manipulation of metals with every practise, and I was getting better with air manipulation as well. And when I found myself with nothing at all to do, I'd be up on the bridge.**

**See, circa midway day three, Stork finally caved from my questions and let me try flying the Condor. With great reluctance, and constant hovering around behind me. After which, if I had a moment's peace, I'd fill it with learning more about flying the airship under Stork's tutoring.**

**It was during one of these 'lessons' when something went _wheeeeeeeeee_ and CRASH, sending an almight shudder through the Condor.**

**The moment everything started shaking, I panicked, knuckles going white as I kept the Condor steady. Stork didn't trust me, possibly with some reason, and he outright fell on top of me, grabbing the steering handles and turning the Condor out of the death-dive. Yanking my hands out from underneath his, I darted to the side and brought up a spy-scope, whilst behind me Piper raced onto the bridge. Finn had been napping on the sofa and the jolt had knocked him clean off.**

**"What's going on?", Piper asked, bringing up the second spy-scope. I was already looking about, scouring the sky for our attackers. I found them circling around below.**

**"Raptors." Oh great, like we'd wanted to see those faces again. They only seemed to be mooks, led by Hork. The main guy was nowhere in sight. Which made things a lot more worrying. **

**Grabbing a comms-microphone off the wall, Piper snapped down it, "We have Raptors attacking from below the Condor. No signs of much heavy artillery."**

**"They have a cannon!", I snapped over to her.**

**"…Okay, they have some heavy artillery. Junko, we need you up here to arm the blaster. Aerrow, Charlotte-"**

**_"We're already in the hangar bay!"_****, Aerrow's voice interrupted her, accompanied by the sound of engines revving. Folding away the spy-scope, I thought hurriedly about going down and joining Aerrow and Charlotte in shooting down some Raptor mooks. But decided against it. This was **Aerrow** and **Charlotte** I was thinking about. It would be a better idea to stay out of range and watch the fireworks (literally).**

_I couldn't help but grin widely as I readied my skimmer. Finally, some proper action to get the fire burning, with an accompaniment of mook-punchbags._

_"Ladies first", Aerrow called over to me, Radarr chirruping with a thumbs-up._

_"You're too kind", I replied, revving the engine before roaring out with a whoop, one that was echoed by Aerrow as he rocketed off behind me. Out the hangar bay, onto the platform, then straight up into the sky. Looping backwards, I dived down, spotting my prey- I mean, the mooks - circling below._

_"How many are there?", I heard Piper ask. _

_"Couple dozen. Shouldn't be a problem", I commented casually. I wheeled down on one side of the group, with Aerrow dropping down on the other side. The comms crackled, and I heard his voice: "You take the twelve on the left, I'll take the twelve on the right."_

_"Deal." _

_As soon as we'd appeared, flying down from the Condor, the Raptors had begun to scatter, some turning and flying away with others shooting around to fire crystal shots from behind. I barrel-rolled to avoid a small barrage, the shots ending up with taking down the Raptor in front of me. Braking hard and moving upward, I let the mook behind me overshoot, before dropping down behind him and speeding up. Once our skimmers were level, I pushed up on my seat and sideways scissor-kicked his head, knocking him off. My own skimmer wobbled nervously, but I regained control. These moves were harder for a one-person skimmer. Aerrow and Radarr were pulling all sorts of teamwork stunts, with the co-pilot bringing the skimmer around in a circular movement with the main pilot balanced on a wing-tip, swords blazing blue as they cut through the wings of mooks skimmers._

_Ah, so romantic._

_Fireballing two mooks' engines so they crashed together, I flew over towards Aerrow as he finished the whirlwind. _

_"I got four so far!", I called over._

_"Really? I'm already on seven."_

_Fuck. Competitive nature roaring, I laughed and brought out my bow. Nocking on an arrow, I shot down one, two, three mooks swiftly, including one that almost knocked into Aerrow from behind. As he glanced back to see a disappearing parachute, I added, "Now we're even."_

_With five each (technically) left to go, plus a mini-boss as Hork, I decided to go straight for Hork. Bonus points, right? He ducked underneath my first charge attack, then the second. Getting annoyed, I flamed up, then spread the fire over the wings of my skimmer. It was a short-time measure, since I didn't want my baby to get badly scorched, but my God did it look badass while on fire._

_"BANZAI!", I shrieked, going third-time lucky and charging Hork again. This time the flames dropped and caught on his skimmer – don't ask me how metal catches fire, I only made sure the fire got onto the skimmer. He panicked, trying to swat the fire, and started shouting over his comms, "Distraction team out! Distraction team out!"_

_SMACK_

_The punch took him clean in the head, and he swayed for a second before his skimmer began to plummet. Shooting down a final mook, I comm-ed Aerrow:_

_"Did you hear Hork?"_

_"What did he say?"_

_"That these guys were just distraction. But what for?"_

_-crackle-_

_Huh, it seemed like the guys from the bridge were trying to contact us. Flicking it on, I "WE NEED YOU GUYS BACK HERE LIKE RIGHT NOW OTHERWISE WE'RE TOAST."_

_"Holy-" I righted my skimmer after that loud screech. Opposite, I could see Radarr hugging his ears with a dismal glare at the comms._

_"Finn, what the hell is going on back there?", Aerrow demanded, wheeling around and aiming back for the Condor, with me right on his tail._

**We only properly realised the mob was a distraction a couple of minutes before Charlotte and Aerrow did. That was when Repton ripped a small hole in the ceiling of the bridge and dropped through.**

**"NO!", Stork shrieked. "Not the Condor!"**

**"Your ship will be the last of your worries once-" Mid evil rant, Repton spotted me staring in mild shock. With the attention turned to me, I waved slowly with a nervous smile. "YOU!"**

**"Yes, me, hello", I said. Okay, wait, why? Stop talking, me. Stop talking. "How's your dignity doing after that time me and my friends beat you up?" I THOUGHT I SAID STOP TALKING! MERLIN DANGIT!**

**Repton hissed angrily, striding over toward me with energy boomerang crackling menacingly. In response, I grabbed a breeze and threw it at his feet, simultaniously stamping up a spot of metal floor. The result: possible concussion. Stork was clutching his head and whining by now, so I quickly returned the floor to normal. **

**"You've fought Repton before?", Piper asked, sounding slightly confused. "I mean, yeah, we understand the wiping the floor with him, of course. But when did you guys-?"**

**"About two hours after getting into Atmos", I replied. "Not bad for newbies, eh, Repty?"**

**Snarling, Repton stood back up, rubbing his jaw. "You shall not mock me with…_pet_-names."**

**"Oh, that sounded wrong in so many ways", I muttered, prepping a palm of fire. Either side of me, I heard Piper bring out her crystal staff and Finn preparing a bolt on his crossbow. Repton scowled, his glare skimming over the three of us. Before a disconcerning leer spread across his face. Bringing out a crystal orb, he slotted it into a place on his chest armour, which, now that I looked properly, seemed to have more wires than normal.**

**The crystal pulsed once, then twice, as yellow glows shot down the wires. Repton seemed to grow before us, muscles doubling in size with scales getting spikier and spikes growing down his spine and over his face. His tail got longer too, the tip becoming something akin to a spiked mace. With a final roar of rage, he slammed his fists down on the floor of the Condor, making twin dents in the metal. **

**_Thunk_****. That was Stork fainting. **

**"I'm getting Aerrow and Charlotte like NOW!", Finn shrieked, his pitch increasing sharply **

**at the end of his sentence as Repton made a swipe at him. Piper drove him back with a**

**smack of her staff. Dropping the fire orb, I decided to do the same, summong my staff and**

**equipping it with a Furnace crystal. Repton kept lunging out every now and again, baring**

**jagged fangs, but Piper and I kept him on the spot. At one point he almost bit my leg and I**

**automatically swung down on his head. Again. And again, and again, until Piper shouted, **

**"I think he's had enough."**

**I paused, only to give him an final whack. Behind us Finn was babbling "There was Repton, and he**

**did this thing, which turned him into a thing kinda like himself but worse, and-"**

**Nabbing the comms-microphone off him, I summarised, "Repton Hulked out using a crystal**

**machine."**

**_"That's not Hulking out, that's going Bane",_**** Charlotte replied.**

**"Either way, he's wrecked the bridge…and not staying down." Repton glowered down at me. I froze.**

**Then something went _broiiing _and he was gone. A furious Stork stood at the helm, a hand on a lever that had been pushed down.**

**"No-one messes with my ship!", he screeched, mostly to himself I think because Repton was gone.**

**The doors to the bridge opened, and Junko popped his head in.**

**"Did I miss something?"**


	12. Chapter 12 - Down and Dusty

_We'd gathered around the table in the middle of the bridge, listening to descriptions of what happened according to Piper, Sam, and Finn. Stork was still fuming, and concentrating on flying the Condor toward Terra Bogaton._

_"If that crystal-device made Repton almost invincible", Aerrow stated, after a moment's thought. "Then we have to find out how he managed to make such a thing, and shut it down for good."_

_"So, we go in there, find the crystal-doohickey, blow it up, and Bob's your uncle", I summarised. Perfect~_

_"No, it's not going to be that easy", said Piper. Bah, party-pooper. I pouted, despite her carrying on, "Without the Bogaton scientists, Repton's most likely set up another laboratory inside his fortress somewhere. Which means we'll be breaking into the heart of his lair."_

_"Shouldn't be too bad, if it's anything better than Cyclonia", I said casually. "And, to be honest, everything's better than Cyclonia."_

_"She makes a point", commented Aerrow. "How hard can it be?"_

_"Well", began Piper, although Sam interrupted, "Cannons?"_

_"We already took those down", explained Junko. "So they shouldn't be a problem."_

_"Unless Repton rebuilt them", said Piper. "Not to mention he'll have scouts around. Terra Bogaton's not known for being a good place to hide, being mostly sparse forests, dusty landscapes and prairies. We'd have to leave the Condor behind, like the last time we were there, and go in by skimmer."_

_Radarr chirruped loudly, hopping onto the table to get everyone's attention. He promptly hunched over and let out a shriek, then shrugged._

_"Radarr makes a point. What happens if Repton finds us and has the crystal-device before we find it?", asked Aerrow. I broke in at this point:_

_"Can we stop calling it just the crystal-device? It's not even a name. What about the Bane crystal?"_

_"Or the Hulk-machine?", Sam added._

_"Bane crystal. Dependent on technology."_

_"Hulk-machine. Have you seen what it did to Repton? No."_

_"I vote Bane crystal", said Aerrow._

_"Bane crystal", added Piper._

_"Hulk-machine." Finn._

_"Hulk-machine." Junko._

_Silence. Everyone looked back at Stork. Realising he was being stared at, he glanced back and muttered, "The Energiser."_

_"…Good name."_

_"I like it."_

_"So, it's called the Energiser then." Nods from around the table._

_"Back to the plan", Piper redirected attention to the main matter at hand. "If we meet Repton and he has the Energiser, we need to figure out a way of deactivating the crystal so we can take it off him and destroy it."_

_"I dunno, should we destroy it?", Sam asked._

_"Um, yes. Imagine if Master Cyclonis got her hands on it."_

_"Point made."_

_Piper held up a blue crystal, plugged into a metal orb surrounded by wires._

_"I've made this little fella to do just the thing. Once activated, it'll let out a pulse that'll not only knock out the Energiser, but actually it'll knock down most things around it. And it may take out any other crystals around."_

_"So, it's a crystal version of an EMP", said Sam. _

_"EMP?"_

_"An electromagnetic pulse. It disables anything powered by electricty." Pausing, Sam added, "Your thingy would be more of a CMP. A crysto-magnetic pulse?"_

_Piper frowned, raised her eyebrows, then nodded with a shrug, her thoughts moving over the Earth references with some confusion apparently. _

_"And while your CMP-doohickey is charging up, what do we do?", I asked grumpily. _

_"You guys distract Repton."_

_"In any way-?"_

_"Any way possible." I grinned broadly._

_"Hell yeah."_

_As we started to pack up to head out, Aerrow pulled me over to the side, cupping his hands around my cheeks. _

_"It's gonna be pretty nasty out there", he said. "So just tell me you'll be careful. I don't want you getting hurt or anything."_

_"I've taken down gargoyles, demons and angsty gods. This shouldn't be too hard", I replied with a scoff. Aerrow raised an eyebrow, and I shrugged. "Thanks for caring. You be careful too."_

_"I've taken down the Dark Ace a dozen times. Naturally." We chuckled, and he kissed me briefly on the nose before moving on. I cupped my nose in my hands, smiling widely._

_"Awww." Looking up, I spotted Sam with a potato sack over one shoulder, grinning widely._

_"What?", I snapped. "No, really, what have you got in there?"_

_Sam shoved a hand back into the sack, pulling out something greenish-brown, knobbly and studded with spikes._

_"Spiny spuds."_

_"…Okay."_

_As I turned about, Junko collided into me. Ow. Not nice._

_"I'm outta ammo!", he panicked. "Don't suppose you have anything I could use?" Glancing about, I looked to Sam. She dove into her magical hammerspace pockets and pulled out a familiar bag…_

_"Use this", I snarked, chucking over the psychology bag and dashing off._

**With bags of spiny spuds at the ready, I rumbled out of the hangar after Junko. We were heading off in small groups, aiming to fly around the terra and join up with the others outside Repton's lair. Junko and I were to take down any groups of scouts or laser-beams machines in the way of the other groups. Junko was carrying more usual crystal shells, and had looked confused when I turned up with spiny spuds.**

**"If all else fails", I'd told him. "Charlotte or I can go earth mage on anything bad and scaley."**

**Leaving the Condor behind, we flew in at a fairly low altitude before rising up and over a bank of tree-tops. Below us, I spotted Aerrow, Piper, Finn and Charlotte fly up and revert their skimmers to motorbike mode, tearing off on invisible pathways. Up ahead though, I could see our first group of scouts: only three of them, and oblivious.**

**Taking one small bag of spuds, I emptied it out over them. Their wails of pain followed by a series of lasers sounded the first casualties of the silent attack.**

**Well, silent may have been an understatement?**

**It didn't take long for more groups of scouts to converge toward us, some taking to the air but most of them roaring along on dirt bike-style skimmers behind the ground-team. They were plucked off one by one, by crystal shot, crossbow shot, sword shot, or rocks rising out of the ground to punch their faces in. In the air, Junko was walloping scouts down as soon as they got in range, knuckle busters glowing with green energy. **

**I threw spiny spuds. Same effect.**

**_"Do you think Repton's noticed us yet?"_****, I heard Finn commenting over the comms-system.**

**"If he hasn't then he's more stupid than we thought", I muttered. **

**_"This was meant to be a stealth mission"_****, Piper lamented. _"Not a distraction mission!"_**

**_"But that could work"_****, Charlotte piped up. _"If the air team keep up the work and some of us drop back and go around, he'll be distracted by them and leave the labs for us to investigate and maybe set a booby-trap."_**

**_"Alright then, new plan it is"_****, said Aerrow. _"Junko, Finn, you take care of the scouts. The girls and I will go on around."_**

**_"Aw man."_**

**_"Shut up Finn!"_**

**"You're not the one who's more likely to get a rematch against Energised-Repton", I said, on part agreeing with Charlotte. Peeling away from the dog-fight, I dropped down and engaged motorbike mode. Spotting the three others racing away towards a set of dusty half-covered trenches, I dropped down and slotted in behind Piper.**

**"These should lead to a blind spot below Repton's lair", she explained, pointing down the twisting maze of trenches. "After that, we need to find a way to get underground and break in."**

_Dust, dust, fucking dust everywhere. What wasn't dust was rock, and what wasn't rock was prickly shrubbery. Why anyone would want anything like that in their garden or forest I don't understand. I brushed a thin layer of dust out of my hair with a sour grimace as we all pulled up some distance away from Repton's lair. _

_"Do you think leaving the skimmers out here will be fine?", Piper asked._

_"They won't be seen from the tower thanks to the treeline", Aerrow reassure her. "And they're above the patrol path so if anyone looks up they won't see them there."_

_Sliding down on foot into another trench, this one more bowl shaped than tube shaped, Piper started looking around for a cave or possible tunnel entrance. _

_"I dunno why you're looking", I said. "I can make one easy peasy, as long as it gets me away from all this dust." Without another word, I stomped on the ground, bringing my hands apart and shoving a block of earth in two. Sam coughed in the resulting dust-storm, her staff in one hand._

_"You know, I could've just knocked, but nooo you had to go all Earth-bender style", she snarked, as I leveled out the hole into a set of stairs._

_"Oh shush." I led the way on down, lighting a pair of will-o-wisps to break the gloom. An electric blue glow came from Aerrow's swords as he did the same. Once at the bottom of the stairs, I shunted more of the earth out of the way into a smooth corridor, making sure not to distablise it or bring it crashing down on our heads. Piper carried a crystal that seemed to act akin to a compass, allowing us to keep going in the right direction. _

_"…Are we-", Sam started but I interrupted quickly._

_"That's Hannah's job."_

_"Oh yeah."_

_It didn't even take that long, although regular earth-shuntings were a pain for the arms. The last one had me opening a hole at the end, leading into some sort of room, and promptly flopping backwards. Thank God Aerrow was behind me otherwise it would have ended up really awkward. He caught me anyway._

_"You okay?", he asked._

_"Nope, I think I knocked my head on something red and cute", I replied, and he chuckled, hugging me briefly before pushing me upright. As Sam stuck her head in through the hole, she called back at me, "Honestly, you were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off."_

_The hole had cracked open the side of a cavernous room. It didn't look very science-y, being lit mostly by a sparse number of yellow lamp-bars, and with a number of tables scattered about. A machine stood tall and ominous in the corner, conveyor-belts connected to a series of entrances to the machine, as well as linking it to the many tables . Protruding from the top of the machine was some sort of claw._

_"Oooooo", Sam cooed. "The claw!"_

_"Focus Sam, we have stuff to smash", I snapped, poking her head. Whilst she whined in annoyance, Piper was investigating items that had been scattered across the tables._

_"It looks something like what Repton had attached to him", she commented, holding up a framework of wires. "Except it's only half made."_

_"That's Raptor work for you", said Aerrow. "If it's not done by the scientists, it's barely done at all."_

_"But what about that frame that Repton was wearing?", Sam said with a frown. "Because that seemed pretty complete."_

_"Hello!", I shouted, hopping onto a conveyor belt. "Can I smash these things already? Because I'm bored! And this looks like what finishes off the frames and adds Energiser crystals considering it's got a slot in here that's full of those SHIT."_

_The belt had started moving beneath my feet. Panicking, I scrabbled toward the end, trying to jump off. But figured 'fuck it' and hopped off the side. As frames began to slide off the tables and onto conveyor belts, Piper jammed her staff into one of the belts._

_"If we stop the frames from getting to the machine, they won't be finished", she called over. "That's your call Charlotte."_

_"Fuck yeah!", I yelled, promptly flaming the conveyor belt I'd gotten off. Aerrow took out two more with twin crystal blasts, and Sam brought a chunk of fresh glass onto another._

_"STOP YOU IMBECILES."_

_A scaley punch rocked my vision, sending me flying over the remains of a belt. _

_"Charlotte!"_

_Thankfully my landing wasn't as rocky as I expected, as Aerrow dived to the side and caught me. We barrell-rolled a couple metres, me tucked safely in Aerrow's arms. Once we stopped, I slowly sat up with him._

_"You caught me?", I mumbled._

_"Of course I did", he replied with a grin. "I'll always catch you."_

_"As cute as you guys are, WE HAVE A SITUATION!", Sam yelled at us. Repton pounced from over a smashed belt, boomerang out and pissed as hell…He also had my bag stuck to some of his spines. _

_What the fuck?_

_"You destroyed my weapons!", he hissed. "Thankfully, I still have the resources to destroy you!"_

_"Oh my gosh, was that a word with three syllables?", Piper taunted casually from behind the Raptor, before firing an energy shot at his head. That distracted him from swiping of my and Aerrow's heads, as we ducked and rolled out of range. Repton simply smirked, scurrying toward the machine and pulling down on a lever. The claw hummed, sparked, and swung down, plucking an Energiser crystal from within and dropping it into Repton's claw. _

_"Stop him!", Aerrow yelled, already breaking into a sprint. I cracked the earth in two, sending the break underneath Repton's feet. He sprang up, jumping the gap and landing on the machine. As he did, he lobbed my psychology bag from his back (traitor). I just about blocked it, the heavy weight knocking me back into Aerrow's arms. We looked up to see Repton push the crystal into the slot on the framework._

_"Fire in the hole!", shouted Sam, although instead of ducking she armed herself, also forming a decent chunk of armour from chunks of glass circling an arm. Spotting the remains of a belt, I flamed up my hand and punched the belt. A black gauntlet formed over my fist, with pieces of rubber wrapped around it. _

_Repton…holy shit, I could see where Sam had been coming from when she said 'Hulking out'. He hunched over, the sudden increase of mass causing the metal beneath him to crumple. Not caring, he leapt down with a raging roar, grabbing a fistful of metal and tearing it from the machine._

_"I think he just tore up his own machine", Aerrow commented, with some confusion. "Well, that's one less job for us then I suppose."_

_"Still got a pretty big one to go though", added Piper. She aimed her staff and fired, but the shots didn't even faze Repton, as he lobbed the ball of metal at Aerrow. He sliced it cleanly in two with a dual swipe that launched a energy curve and cut right through the metal, leaving the pieces to part either side of him and crash into the walls of the room._

_Aw. My. Gosh._

_"Charlotte, now is not the time to be fangirling over hot action", Sam snapped. _

_"But he's fighting!", I retorted._

_"You should be too!"_

_"Oh. Right." With Aerrow on the other side of Repton, I sprinted toward the Raptor. He turned, roared again, but I concentrated more on sticking the cartwheel I started. As I went forward into a handspring from the cartwheel, I shoved power into the earth, causing a block to launch me upwards and out of range of Repton's claws. From there I somersaulted over Repton, sticking a landing next to Aerrow. Who, naturally, was a little gobsmacked._

_"So, what's the plan?", I asked, smiling widely._

_"Hit it with everything we got", he replied with an similar grin._

_"This is why we're dating." _

_Aerrow and I hammered Repton from the front, with a double cascade of blue lightning and orange fire. Complementary colours! The attack knocked him back several steps, but his response was simply to get back up and charge the two of us. We jumped away, and from behind Sam and Piper lobbed a pair of CMPs._

_"Watch out you guys!", Piper called to us. "There's a slight side-"_

Whu-bump.

_Twin shockwaves shot out from the crystal grenades, feeling like a wall of air had slammed me in the face. The glow surrounding Aerrow's swords blinked once, twice, then faded out. Piper's and Sam's crystal staffs fizzled out. However, Repton's Energiser continued to glow. _

_"Oh dear", Piper murmured. Well that was a huge fucking understatement. I felt it necessary to yell that over to her. Repton's grin grew larger, seeing that most of our weapons were now useless, and he lashed out a claw that picked Aerrow right off the ground and he promptly threw him. _

_A chunk of earth rocketed up and stopped Aerrow from recieving a painful landing. Relax, I'd made sure the ground was fairly soft for him. As it dropped slowly back down with him on top, I turned to Repton with fire in my eyes. Quite literally, seeing as I was starting to glow with rage from the embers that were crackling on my skin._

_"NO-ONE. HITS. MY BOYFRIEND!", I screeched. _

_"Pretty much anyone else is fair game though", Sam added quietly. _

_With an angry roar, I charged at Repton. One punch, then two punches smacked his snout, but he twisted round and caught me in the gut with his spiked tail. Sam came in from the side with a barrage of glass and will-o-wisps, which took his attention for a good while. After bringing the streams of glass shards around from a couple knocks on Repton's back, she melded them into one long sword and brought it down on Repton's foot. His response: kick it to pieces. Piper lobbed a chunk of metal at his head, distracting him long enough to miss a swipe at Sam, who darted back to safety._

_As Piper rejoined our group, looking more tired and knocked-about than when we entered the place, Aerrow spoke urgently, "Okay, we need a new plan of attack."_

_"Repton you're going down!", I shrieked, mostly ignoring him._

_"Wait!", interrupted Piper. "Do you know that saying 'if you want to shoot the general, first you shoot the horse'?"_

_"If you want to shoot the general", I growled. "You should just SHOOT THE FUCKING GENERAL."_

KABAM_. A cannonball of mashed up metal was flung at us. Piper and Sam dived one way, Aerrow and I the other._

_"As much as I really agree to your plan", Aerrow spoke breathlessly. "I think we should think up some sort of other plan. FIREBALL."_

_I turned on command, shooting a fireball toward another cannonball, this one made up of old frameworks. They collided, and the metal exploded in a shower of green sparks. _

_This lit up an idea in my head._

_"Okay, I have a plan", I whispered to Aerrow, grinning._

_"Great! What is it?", he asked. I brought my hands up, shifted them apart. Turning to Piper and Sam, Aerrow called, "Clear the way!" Obediently, the girls jumped out of the way, giving a clear path to Repton. I let out a deep breath, focused, closed my eyes._

_Then let out a screech of "BANZAI!" as I charged straight at the Raptor. My whole self ignited, and my feet seemed to speed. I was running faster than I'd ever run before, leaving ashes on the ground and **WHACK**. I smacked my shoulder into Repton, one hand reached back and punching the Energiser crystal where it met the framework. As he fell back, I snagged a shoulder and flipped clean over, landing on a chunk of rock that zoomed in from the side and lifted me up as Repton's frame burst into green fire. He promptly started running around screeching, considering he was on fire I'm not surprised. Tearing the framework off, he flung it, already starting to shrink as the effects of the Energiser wore off. Sam sprayed a light shower of water over the blackened remains of the mechanics, that promptly dissolved into mushy black ash._

_Shaking his head, in despair, annoyance, or disbelief I don't know, Repton turned around only to be met with the sight of Finn and Junko storming in through the tunnel entrance, crystal weapons aglow._

_"Their stuff must still be working since they weren't around when the CMPs went off", Piper said, clearing up any confusion showing on mine, Sam and Aerrow's faces. Repton hissed, going for his boomerang…but that was dead._

_"Oh no", he muttered simply, as Aerrow and I ran up to him and gave him a twin ninja-kick to the face, sending him flying to the wall. _

_"Dude", Finn muttered. "That was AWESOME! Totally in sync you guys."_

_"How did they do that?!", Junko cheered. "Although, maybe it's 'cause they're so close." He hurried up to me and Aerrow, grinning widely. "That was so cool, seeing you guys work as a couple!" And promptly hugged us._

_"Junko lungs deflating!", I gasped. _

**I was laughing, quite a lot, at the sight of Junko's crusher hug. Then I was distracted by Finn tapping my shoulder.**

**"So, those two managed to pull off a cool move together", he said, 'totally casually'. "Maybe then-"**

**"Finn", I interrupted, before he could go any further. "Take ten steps back."**

**"Why?"**

**"So you are _away_ from me." And I moved away myself before he could say anything else. Argh, that was just too awkward. Suggesting we be like Charley and Aerrow. I refused to be third choice in this group, just, no.**

**"We should get outta here, before we get called on to do clean-up", Piper commented, already heading for the exit.**

**"Like hell I'm doing any clean-up", chuckled Charlotte drily. "I'm out. Whoa." She stumbled, falling forward only for Aerrow to catch her.**

**"That was a crazy move you did back there", he said. "Are you sure you're okay?"**

**"My head hurts a bit. And I'm pretty sure I'm drained now." **

**"Alright then. Just hold on a sec." He picked her up, carrying her bridal-style. Aw my gosh! I couldn't help but "Aw", quietly at the sight. Charlotte glanced over at the little sound, and just grinned. I'm not surprised.**

**After snagging the psychology bag again, I took over Charlotte's role of will-o-wisp-maker for the return journey down the tunnel, one that was rushed as we ran to get to the skimmers.**

**"How did Repton get here so quickly?", I asked Junko as we jogged.**

**"We were busy doing our distraction business, when Repton turned up kinda out of nowhere", Junko explained. "He was heading down this one path, and, well, a bunch of skimmers fell on him as the outcrop collapsed."**

**"Our skimmers?!", Charlotte cried out, overhearing us. "No! My Harley baby!"**

**"I call that fate turning around to bite us in the butt", I muttered. **

**"If my Harley is hurt, someone is going to die."**

**"The skimmers were fine", Junko reassured her. "But Repton got seriously annoyed. And found your tunnel. He musta figured out your plan from there because he left in a hurry."**

**"Fair 'nough", said Aerrow.**

**Outside in the sunshine (which was blinding in comparison to the dimness of the tunnel and underground room) we had to slide down another ditch to where our skimmers were now sprawled. Junko rightened Charlotte's skimmer and Aerrow placed her on the seat, while Finn helped righten mine and Piper's skimmers. Well, he tried. It was the thought that counts. As soon as we were ready we tore away from there like several hyperactive bats on fire out of hell.**

**"Mission success!", Aerrow whooped over the radio as we speeded up to where the Condor waited for us.**

**"Good for you", came Stork's reply. "At least I don't have to arrange any funerals."**

**Aw, he did care.**


End file.
